Harry Potter, our Lord
by Black Scribler
Summary: AU Story where Harry is not BWL, but something much more. Super!Harry.
1. Chapter 1

Harry Potter, our Lord

A.N.

This is my first fanfiction. It is an A.U. and Powerful Harry story. All the plot-angles are probably already done in other fanfiction stories, and to all authors recognising their stories I submit my sincere apologies (and my thanks, I enjoyed reading the stories). I have read some truly great Potterfiction, of the quality similar to the original work of JK Rowling. For this reason and because Harry Potter shows such great potential for crossovers, I decided to create my own Potterverse. I am rather occupied, but will try to update as often as possible.

English is not my mother tongue and I have no beta, spelling should be ok (thanks to automatic spell-checker) but there could be some errors in language or simply bad and confused writing.

All comments are welcomed (don't be needlessly harsh). So far only general frame of the story is set, so if you have particular desire how this story should proceed I am open to suggestions.

Disclaimer:

Since official series of Harry Potter books is published and over, all Harry Potter worlds belong to fanfiction authors (Me! Bwahahaha! – evil laugh). All credits for original creation and commercial benefits go to JKR.

Part 1

Chapter 1 The birth

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'It has been one year (at least I think it has) since my imprisonment in this Hell-on-Earth. The Hell has become much worse now than it was before, courtesy of the new Ministry. It is quite an irony when you think about it: The Symbol-of-Light Family improving this place into the ultimate black hole of despair. The only way to keep my sanity here is writing these lines, and loosing sanity is not an option in this place any more. Luckily no one thought I could use my silver hand to write on the walls. Unfortunately I used one of phalanges for this year, which leaves eleven more years before some sort of unimaginable torment claims my soul, unless Lord takes mercy on it.'

'It took me quite some time to create this master plan, the time I wasted on writing gibberish on these walls. Now is the time I put in motion my little vengeance and practical joke against the Dark Lord. I pray this place is truly god-forsaken as its reputation seems to suggest.'

'Do not know what day it is, but in this glorious moment I am starting to write my knowledge of the Dark Lord. I hope those reading these lines will be worthy of this knowledge. Luckily, even without a wand and in the high security, I still can perform glamour on the walls. I am sure the Dark Lord would not be pleased with my writing, he values his privacy – it has been a major key to his success. Just as I am sure the he is not pleased when I am referring to him with the same title I used when kissing Tom Riddle's feet. The truth is that this designation is truly fitting, he is the Lord of the darkness and the unknown and the hidden, protector of all these unsuspecting sheep.'

'Many have coveted and pretended to rule the darkness. Where countless others have failed, he has succeeded. Where so many empires have crumbled, his achievement will forever remain unchallenged, and I am his humble servant. He rules the world in perfect manner, always remaining in the shadows, never letting himself be seen by either forces of good or of evil.'

'Betrayal of secrets is viewed as worse than any other crime in the Wizarding world. It creates weak spots and opportunity for other crimes in otherwise secured environment. To commit a crime one must necessarily use either betrayal or infiltration. Rat is my nature and he was always attracted by power. That is one of reasons why I like James, but James was never ready to use the power - at least not completely as Riddle was.'

Lines from the Book of the Dark Lord, the holy scriptures of the Council,

supposedly written by a human named Peter Pettigrew on a long disappeared world called "Earth"

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This is a story of the events behind what, in later years on British Isles, came to be known as "the Dark Lord incident". It is also a story of the things like quest, cosmic accidents and karma that shape one's destiny, but above all it is a story of the great unknown that lies all around us.

The version that will be related in these lines is unofficial, in fact it is probably even beyond fifth or six hand rumour. Nevertheless, this version is complete truth, and it is only because there are so many rumours about these events that we feel confident enough to allow it to be known, certain that nothing will be taken seriously enough to have any impact on our world. Although, the incident in itself was swift, some circumstances of the event are connected far into the past and are having durable consequences.

Our story starts on the warm evening of 31 of July 1980. At this particular moment the man named James Potter is walking nervously along the halls of maternity ward at St. Mungo's Hospital. He is about to enter the next phase in joys of fatherhood after valiantly supporting his wife Lily during pregnancy.

His anxiety has reached new scales as he is now alone. Some moments ago he was still together with his colleague in stress, Frank Longbottom. James has just left the room where Frank and Alice were saying first 'hello' to their son Neville, and is about to face his own predicament of supporting wife through labour.

To unsuspecting observer James Potter would seem like any other anxious father-to-be. That is of course if one neglected the fame status of the Potter family. Even to the most general public the Potters were symbol of the highest British aristocracy. Their status is equal to the one of the Spencers and the Windsors, but they always kept extremely low profile like the Hellsings. It was only during brief period, while James was at the Academy, that the spotlights were ever directed on the family. It was James' "dashing playboy" period. It started by some girl magazine publishing a story about a very handsome young man from a rich and noble family right out of boarding school attending some military academy. It got interesting because James really had the looks. He was probably the most dashing among young noblemen. And so the snowball started rolling, and soon James was sharing pages with all princes and princesses of the Royal family.

To the great pain of his parents, James fully enjoyed this sudden spotlight. It went well with his "bully" and "spoiled brat" act from the school and he was amused immensely to have an opportunity and built a new personality act he used to call "rich playboy", later in what became his favourite book he found similar character called Zaphod Beeblebrox.

Fortunately for the family, this phase ended quickly after one last great story concerning marriage of James Potter to his school sweetheart Lily Evans.

Though even in general public this story was big, there is a community where this story reached levels one could almost dare call "Messiah's coming", or as would be more appropriate for this community "Merlin's coming". This community call themselves "Wizards and Witches".

Like Douglas (a smart person) used to say: "Things are not always what they seem", or William: "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, etc. – you know the rest", and though many aspects of this story could be told without involving magic what so ever, there are some points that require messing with the "supernatural".

So we are now going to open those invisible doors that separate our seemingly "normal" and "ordinary" world from its true complexity. Concept of "normal" is probably the most widespread concept in all realities and dimensions where sentient beings live. It seems greater the knowledge about true complexity of things (which is always incomplete for the greatest part) more people are paranoid and drastic in their means of guarding what they consider "normal". This attitude explains why such great number of "supernatural" communities ignore their mutual existence.

Unfortunately for many of our fellow citizens who already have enough problems with criminality, unemployment, politics, etc., we live in this particular reality where our world is literally swimming in a cosmic vortex of magic. We don't like using label "supernatural" for magic, as it is often used with misplaced belief that magic is beyond nature or not having its place in nature. If we follow the logic of naming extreme physical states "superconductor" or "superliquid", than the word that fits the best to describe magic is "superscience". Arthur said (another smart person): "When sufficiently advanced magic and science are indistinguishable".

To best understand the state of our world we recommend consulting the data base of the Unspeakables. The Unspeakables are the intelligence agency of the Wizarding world, they are often wrongly compared to the CIA or such muggle (wizard language for ordinary people) equivalent as they are actually more open, and all dangerous information is really dangerous and shouldn't be tempered with. The reason why Wizards and Witches completely ignore the activities of the Unspeakables is that Wizarding world was created (in the 17th century, after series of witch-hunts) with main purpose that majority could enjoy magic while being defended by the few, and they prefer to continue living in false security and are, like we said, even more paranoid about "normality" than Muggles.

The Unspeakable data base gives following information regarding world population:

Inhabitants belonging to endemic species:

Completely human population:circa 6'000'000'000

Percentage having any superior aspect or abilities: 10%

Percentage Wizards and Witches: 1%

Percentage all magical: 3%

Contaminated human population:circa 1'000'000'000 (data is incomplete)

Vampires

Weres

Hybrids (various genetic mixtures)

Other infections (demonic, possessions, etc)

Sentient species of non demonic origin:circa 3'000'000'000 (data is incomplete)

Elves

Gnomes

Goblins

Centauri

Veelas

Merpeople

Nymphae

Fays

Sentient species of demonic origin:circa 5'000'000 (data is highly incomplete)

Midians (demons dwelling in darkness – not necessarily vulnerable to light)

Lamiahs (Succubi, etc.)

Youkai (nomenclature borrowed from Japanese – refers to various human-shaped demons)

Ancients

Other (various transdimensional, etc.)

Artificial beings

Homunculi

Replicants

Higher beings (dwelling on higher planes of existence):circa 1'000'000'000'000 (data is highly incomplete)

Dead (all non demonic species)

Banished demons

Other higher beings

Inhabitants belonging to non-endemic species:(numbers are subject to important fluctuations)

Antarian

Thaelon-Jaridian

Khimera

Other life forms

Administrative organisation of magical population – Following communities have organised themselves in order to facilitate integration and hiding of magic

Wizarding world:

European Ministries

The Ancient Empire (Asian Wizarding communities)

The Caliphate

United States Magic community, regulated by the Magical State Department

Ministry of Others (regulates communities of "Others" in the Soviet Union and the Far East – term "Other" refers to any supernatural being)

Druids-Brujos-Shamans-Doctors (various hidden communities, practicing more nature-oriented magic)

Elementals

Nabari (Far East community of martial artists and chi practitioners, integrated in muggle-world)

Now that we have better understanding of our world, we can continue with the story. Let's check on our wizard, James Potter. He is currently encouraging Lily while getting his hand painfully squeezed. Although everything is physically normal with both foetuses, there is strange feeling of shroud or emptiness around one that is limiting the usual feel a magical mother has of her babies. The couple is being cheered for by other members of the Potter coven from the outer chamber.

While in their fifth year at Hogwarts, Lily and James discovered certain books in both Restricted Section and later in the Potter library. They discovered that all aspects of already extremely powerful Potter family magic could be made completely insanely and freakishly strong by applying certain rituals and practicing certain way of life. They could actually create something to stand against Dark rituals and the rise of the self-proclaimed Dark Lord. This something is called sex-magic. So they combined their powerful talents to devise rituals and create charms and jinks that could best use this magic, their motto was: "There are much better things to do with a virgin than sacrifices". Soon James coaxed his older brother Charles into joining them and they started gathering followers (read here horny wizards and groupie witches). Their inner circle, as they joked about it, consisted of Sirius and Remus (James' best friends), Frank and Alice (Lily's best friend).

It was the moment when James had outgrown his Marauder phase, and Peter just couldn't stop living in the past – after all the Marauders were his first chance to hide his weakness and pretend to be strong and brave like his fellow Gryffindors. The Pettigrews are after all eternal henchmen and servants like so many lower pureblood families.

As it was expected the little circle Potter and Evans created became huge success at Hogwarts. They recruited from muggleborns to purebloods without distinction, and soon became direct rivals to another circle, led by Lucius Malfoy. Malfoy was the Dark Lord's agent in Slytherin and charged with recruiting future Death Eaters (as his followers called themselves) among purebloods.

Due to the contents of the Dark Lord's propaganda, those ideals could be only popular among pureblood Slytherins, and so when the Potter circle started stepping on the territory belonging to the Malfoy's circle situation at Hogwarts became somewhat Shakespearian. Things got worse when the Black sisters set their eyes on Charles instead of Lucius and his goons – the Lestranges brothers.

After initial skirmishes, things got really ugly and some still unsolved circumstances led to Charles' disappearance during the wandfight at Hogwarts' Express. After that disaster James hit a bad phase, and Lily went completely overboard and seduced Severus Snape into helping her incorporate darker aspects into sex-magic and making it even more powerful and she became known as Mistress Lily. Her actions became strange and disgusting even to Severus and this led to the fallout with Snape and a nearly deadly joke played by Sirius involving Remus' lycanthropy.

Lily and James decided they needed to pull themselves together or they would be eaten by the very same thing they created to fight the Dark Lord. They decided to create extended family or coven: five couples, each representing corner of a pentagram – James and Lily, Frank and Alice, Sirius and Remus and their girlfriends, and Petunia and her fiancé. The type of magical practice practiced by Lily and James does not need actual magical talent or abilities, but family ties, closeness or intimacy of practitioners. Unfortunately this is one of those moments when "normal" showed its head because not even Petunia (though being exposed to magical world and even having minor abilities) let alone her fiancé could stand exposure to what was considered as strange and disgusting practices. This provoked the fallout between the Evans sisters and even the break of Petunia's engagement (in her quest for greater normalcy she later married one Vernon Dursley – the paramount of all things normal).

After this fiasco, James and Lily went bit apart and James went to Auror Academy (period during which he undergone his "playboy" phase), while Lily went to Oxford Occult and later was recruited by Sir Archibald Croaker into Unspeakables.

Lily started working at the Department of Cooperation, in the section that is also under shared authority of the Department of Mysteries. This one section represents what is most secret in the Unspeakables. They work both on most mysterious artefacts and in cooperation with agents from other supernatural communities and in the muggle world. Here Lily met perfect candidates to become fifth couple: Selene, her colleague, and her husband Xenophilius Lovegood. And plans and relationship of Lily and James were rekindled.

That is how in 1975, after a marriage ceremony between James Ambrose Potter and Lily Evans, the new coven was created: Lily and James Potter, Alice and Frank Longbottom, Lin and Sirius Black, Maritza and Remus Lupin, Selene and Xenophilius Lovegood. The name "Potter coven" was elected because of the fame and recognition associated with it (even greater than those associated with the Black family), though jokingly they almost elected "Lovegood coven" as the name.

After several votes of the family assembly and meticulous preparations, the coven decided to perform very special and complex ritual. Although, as they are genetically humans, wizards and witches basically reproduce the same way as muggles, magic plays important part in the process and it is magic that is often responsible for sexual practices often seen as morally suspicious by muggles. Some examples are: wizards and witches openly practice bisexuality – even if you are gay your magic will eventually compel you to seek a partner of opposite sex for reproduction; incest is not forbidden but is not considered as good choice – your magic protects you from creating degenerated children but even magic prefers variety (in pureblood families who employ this practice for the sake of conserving the purity, magically weaker children are discarded and don't participate in future reproduction process); there is no definition for paedophilia as in muggle-world – age of consent is fixed to the moment your magic awakens your sex drive (this age varies among magical species), also wizards and witches would not even consider sex without feeling mutual appeal; although almost non-existent now-days, due to spreading of the pureblood propaganda, in old times relationships between partners of different magical species were accepted occurrence. Of course magic does have its oddities, as it is not a simple tool, but almost a sentient entity, and one never knows what product will be no matter what sexual practice is in use and magic can choose to cease its protection upon the wielder, but I digress here.

As we were saying, magic plays important aspect in reproduction of all magical beings (quite logic when you think about it). Couples often practice rituals where not only do they mix their genetic material, but also their magic.

This led the Potter coven to devise "the Samhain ritual" - as its name says this ritual is performed on the night of Samhain (the most sacred night for all magical beings, not just those of Celtic origin). This ritual is organised into a three-year cycles, two to produce and one to thank the higher powers (it is of utmost importance to properly complete the ritual or else it backfires horribly). This is how the things were scheduled: Samhain(Halloween) 1979 for Lily and Alice, Samhain 1980 for Lin, Maritza and Selene, Samhain 1981 for thanking ritual. This would enable them to produce the magically perfect children.

Ted Tonks was a muggleborn, which meant that until he was 11 all he ever knew were ordinary people. It was only when at Hogwarts that he learnt of magic and what it does to women's beauty (not just as glamours, but as natural process that enhances the beauty even while foetus is developed and during the growing-up and later as defence against aging). He considered himself enormously lucky to marry such beautiful woman as Andromeda Black (even among witches considered as extremely beautiful). He was only happy to oblige and accompany his wife to a society event organised by the Potter family for Halloween 1979 (invitation received from Sirius Black, only member of his wife's family always keeping warm relationship with Andromeda). He never suspected how utterly odd evening he was going to live. This was his "Eyes Wide Shut" moment. He had never been to rich wizard family homes – while entering the Potter castle he felt like a little kid entering many times enhanced Disneyland (Andromeda tried to organise presentation into her family, but it was a disaster); though not known as such by any community, the Potters are the richest in this galaxy cluster (group of fifty odd neighbouring galaxies) – unknowingly to even the Potters the greatest addition to family estate came with Lily Evans (I digress again). It all started as what he assumed was normal evening in super-high society event housing some 5000 guests (all magical species Ted had ever heard of and some he had not) in the greatest hall Ted had seen in his life. Odd things started when floor opened to reveal huge concentric nine ring system of complex runes and patterns that Andromeda noticed was beyond anything seen in the Wizarding world – in the central circle was giant pentagonal mattress covered by silk sheets and pillows – it looked as something from 1001 nights. Guests were invited to move to particular ring they would feel magically called to. Then rings lifted to form a nine level stage, on the central the top-most stage were 10 people Ted learned were members of the Potter family (Ted found it odd as he recognised Sirius there and he knew nothing of covens and extended family practices of the Wizarding world). As some strange music started to play and people to dance something that was closer to disco or tribal dance than ball-room dancing, Ted embraced Andromeda and they started to kiss while dancing. Ted couldn't help himself and started to touch and grope his wife and it became a hot snogging session. As compulsion grew stronger Ted and Andromeda took off their clothes. In a short flash of lucidity they noticed they were on the outer-most and the lowest ring with bunch of other naked couples, all engaged in sexual intercourse, as were the two of them. As rings were getting higher so were the "perversities" that were performed on them. In the middle of that 10 people chanted around the mattress separated in 5 couples, one on each angle. After what seemed like eternity and after coming countless times with his wife, Ted fell down half loosing his consciousness. As he felt drowning himself in the invisible vortex spinning, he could hear from the central stage cries of pleasure and grunting. Lying on the ground with his head turned toward the centre, Ted could see 10 people performing all possible hetero, gay or bi combinations he could imagine and doing various positions, some of them he was sure were light years ahead of Kama-Sutra. He fell asleep half-amused, half-frightened by the sight and the events of the evening.

The Tonks, like the rest of guests, returned home a week later after spending time recharging their batteries (magical and physical). Ted was surprised that no tabloid what so ever (either magical or muggle) published the story of the greatest fuck-fest in the recent history of magic. It is needless to say that the Tonks joined for all festivities and group holidays the Potter coven ever organised after that.

Magic is like everything else in life, no matter how much planning you do there is always possibility of wrench falling in your carefully designed scheme – you know the saying: "the best laid plans for men and mice", etc, etc. In fact, wise practitioners know the more you plan the greater is chance that something will go differently. Question is: will this different be lucky jack-pot or nuclear disaster?

Lily is a very wise woman, highly respected at her work and in all communities she came in touch with. Everybody who witnessed magical, physical and intellectual powers of Lily Potter knew she was among the top level mages like Albus Dumbledore and even Nicholas Flamel.

The ritual was devised not to target particular women of the coven, but to treat them as equal sisters. The only specification was that it would pick two of them in the first year and three others in the second. Lily was therefore, not surprised when even after two weeks there was no feeling of change in her body, while both Alice and Selene showed signs of pregnancy. Three of them were more powerful women of the coven and had equal probability of being chosen by the ritual in the first year.

That was the reason she accepted a diplomatic mission to Moscow to defuse potentially dangerous situation between the Daywatch and the Nightwatch. She had close friends in both camps.

Some incorrect intel led her to being trapped in a crossfire between the two groups, and her situation got worse when, due to circumstances, she ended being swallowed by the gloom. All confrontation stopped immediately as all watched Lily falling to the deepest depths of the gloom. They quickly lost the sight of her as she penetrated the forbidden levels, and only the most experience of Others could feel by indirect means and environmental vibrations of magic how deep she was falling.

It took them 24h to extract her, and after a week in a coma and another week in rehabilitation she was back to her family with decoration for rendered services and an order for temporary retirement – it was discovered she was about three weeks pregnant. It was also cleared that it was false alarm for Selene. Of course Lily was overjoyed; though with apprehension how wrong things could have turned. She was being pampered by everyone and being made to promise not to take such risks in the future. Her only fear remained that though medical scans showed two perfectly developing foetuses, she could magically feel only one.

It was the first in line of strange events that would shape the life of Harry Potter.

This is how it ended with this situation some eight months later: Alice and Frank holding little Neville and cheering from behind the glass with the rest of the family, while Lily is giving birth to the twins – Harry and John (James and Lily were great fans of the Beatles and all the culture they represented and felt immense sadness when they disbanded. They decided to call firstborn of the twins Harry which could stand both for Harrison and Harold – name of James' father, and second John.).

After a final push Harry was out and Lily could now identify that he was a shrouded twin. She repeated the work and John joined his brother. She was so happy, they were so beautiful – and it was really the only thing that mattered. All her fears for Harry – which was the reason they opted for the hospital instead of their home – were now lifted.

Lily is a pragmatic woman when it comes to questions of genetics, childbirth and magic. Like James' mother, she follows some customs only on the surface and knows part of it is bullshit and avoids it. She knows magic has its own agenda when it comes to how it distributes its grace. Her research with the Unspeakables showed both James and she were top results of magically enhanced evolution spanning through many dimensions and species – even though they seem human, and they could expect pretty much anything especially after the ritual.

It is the moment she will hold her children for the first time. She takes John first, she feels the warmth of the bond between them and considerable strength. He is perfect, everything they were hoping to achieve and what the public would want him to be – like James. She already knows Alice and Frank are also happy with Neville. This is good, Harry will need all protection he can get, but not because of weakness or malformations. She knows this kind of shrouded pregnancy does not bring squibs into the world, which would almost be preferable. She takes Harry – at first there is the bond and a diffuse feeling coming from his magic, and then she can feel it, beyond what she was prepared to expect.

If she wasn't such a composed woman she would start laughing hysterically at the humour of the gods, the higher powers, the magic or whatever was responsible for the events. It's not the usual type of magic – thank god for small favours, at least it is not detected by the fools from the Ministry and she hopes by anyone else (they would have to touch him at least) – it is her own brand of magic, one she was keeping hidden away even from her own family. Actually this power is not magic as she had learnt to define it through her work. This power lies between what is considered science and what is the most basic nature-based magic; even before science becomes magic there are extreme phenomena it develops, one of them she calls "the force".

While touching Harry she got an image of the great galactic vortex of magic that is bathing stars of the Milky Way, and somewhere on the galactic rim she could see emergence of a new vortex of different nature. The force vortex expanded until it reached size of its magical counter-part. She could see this new object starting to emit waves equivalent to gravitational waves emitted by a black hole. This entire structure actually is a "force" hole – something she didn't think could possibly exist, let alone be created by a person. Looking at the waves of force spreading through the structure of the universe, she saw they created no disturbance either in magic or in ordinary substance and energy; even on the higher planes the force vortex attracted nobody. After several more moments of careful scrutiny and she could let herself relax a little, knowing that Harry's birth attracted no unwanted attention. One last thing needed to be done: Selene and Lily will take the boys to the echo-M chamber at the Unspeakables to make clear assessment of the boys' power.

And so everything was calm in the best of the worlds as the slow and silent tempest prepared to unleash the power. Those of the most powerful players in the power food chain of the universe who did notice something, and would normally crush the source of such disturbance straight away, were all misled seeing that destiny had organised an attack to take place that would either destroy baby's magic or kill the child. No entity of our universe, no matter how powerful, was able to see what was hidden in the shadows of beyond and what just entered our world.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2: First steps

After the headlines, that had taken important portion of 'the Sun' and complete edition of 'the Daily Prophet', about the wedding of James "Valmont" Potter, and after many young witches and to lesser extent young muggle girls had shed some tears, things went quiet rather quickly (like often is the case in such situations). Lord and Lady Potter could again enjoy the calm shrouding the Potter family and lack of interest from the public opinion, largely thanks to few convenient pushes from the Queen's administration on couple of journalists – both muggle and magical. The three boys entered this life in complete peace and quiet, much to the joy of their family.

Life for the Potter coven entered a new phase. Having their own families now and being of noble descent as heirs to Longbottom and Potter Lordships, Frank and James were expected to take more active part in the family business and to build their political careers.

For Frank it was fairly easy, he was simply a son from a noble magical family of average importance. For people who grew up in such environment it was nothing complicated.

James, on the other hand, dreaded this moment ever since the 'death' of Charles. How he wished he would once again be younger son of Lord Potter and not the next in line for the title.

If you were to describe Lord Potter with one word, the most suitable would be 'the Godfather'. In a world of secrets, power plays and which has its own set of rules parallel to muggle law system, Potter patriarch always had the role of respect and beacon of light.

From time to time other great names would emerge, like Albus Dumbledore – defeater of Grindelwald, head of Wizengamot and holder of the title "greatest wizard of his time", still the Potters always remained principal pillar of the community. For there is one truth every Potter was certain of: You could never win against evil in an open conflict. Countless wars waged in the name of good had proven it before, whenever there was an open conflict number of victims would soon cloud all noble ideals and render them utterly meaningless. And that is, of course, if you were arrogant enough to be certain what ideals are noble enough to initiate such bloody battles in the first place.

What also needs to be taken into consideration beyond simple "good vs. evil" is the fact that all criminals can possibly have families and friends who can be innocent bystanders. In such situations it is better to settle things quietly than to create endless cycles of vengeance and putting additional risk on your own family.

The Potters not only had great amount of richness to administrate, they were also at the head of several shady, semi-legal, and sometimes downright criminal, enterprises. Such activity enabled them to always be in contact with elements that needed to be kept in line.

Of course it was completely ignored by general public – muggle and magical, that the Potters owned such businesses. In many cases even the collaborators were kept in the dark about who truly pulls the strings.

While not wanting to spoil their children, the Potter coven took firm decision to provide the happiest childhood possible, regardless of the circumstances surrounding magical world and their family.

Beginning of a life in the wizarding world is pretty much the same as in the muggle world. Newborns need all attention of their parents to properly grow and be healthy, which is, after all, the main concern even among magical population. For magical population things are more complicated than for muggles: they also need to see to proper magical growth of their children.

A week after the birth, Lily and Selene scheduled special visit to Unspeakable facilities. It was a practice among employees to organise these visits with aim to properly scan magical abilities of their children, rather than use quick hospital tests, both for the reason of keeping children's potential secret and for the level of detail that can be obtained from this scan.

This is one of those aspects which muggles might have difficulty accepting. For Unspeakable facilities represent the greatest storage place for mysterious and dark artefacts in the world, and it doesn't seem like good idea to bring your children there. However, for magical population it is quite usual to take some risks even with the lives of your children to give them better chances at survival in the long run.

Taking risks doesn't mean doing it blindly, and Lily and Selene had previously checked that all potentially dangerous items would be far away from children.

Lily, Selene and Alice, each carrying a baby, entered laboratory where the echo-M chamber was.

The echo-M chamber, as its name suggests, measures the affinity of objects to magic. It is built to give the complete scan and everything that is known about magic was put into its construction.

Chamber is spherical with a platform in its centre above which is the beam shutter. The walls are covered with isolation blocking all outside magic and on the top of that is detection layer. When the shutter opens, object is exposed to the beam of, what is called total magic. This beam contains all magical harmonics coming from the Galactic vortex and also harmonics corresponding to all mathematical models of magic. The total magic is supposed to represent all forms the magic could possibly take (of course you can already guess that is far from truth).

Detection layer measures intensity and frequency, and shows at which angle the incoming beam of magic was scattered. This detection layer also vibrates when hit by magic and pattern of waves spreading across the surface represents additional information.

Pattern of waves gives information about type of magic and harmonics. Frequency, intensity and angle give information about affinity, species, and type and size of magical core and magical stream system of a person.

Before the tests, three women thoroughly verified all measuring systems of the chamber.

They are going to start with John. After initial discussion between mothers, it was established that he seems to have the most ordinary signature among three boys.

John was sedated and placed on the platform. The chamber was then hermetically shut (it is large and the scan is quick enough, so there is no danger of suffocation).

The shutter opens and the beam of magic descends upon the child. Pattern of scattered rays hits the detection surface. Though remarkable, the scan results are pretty much as predicted. The magic detected has the signature of the Galactic vortex, which is normal as all magical beings from this galaxy have it. The principal colour – yellow – of the scan is one associated with appurtenance to human species and being a wizard. There are also some colours showing that Potters were crossbreeding with other magical species.

Direction of scattered rays indicates normal spherical core and normal magical stream system. Remarkable fact is that his magical strength already equals his fathers'. Lily's initial feeling was indeed confirmed: John was very powerful normal wizard. He could become perfect representative of the Potter family among the purebloods.

Next was Neville, the feeling Alice got when she first took him left her slightly worried, though overall she got normal feeling of bond and magic.

At first the result showed only slight yellow colour – almost like it was scan of a squib. Then they were able to see it – the mountain of intensity in the purple. Neville also had the same type of magical core and stream system like John. Neville has the normal wizard core system, but it seems his magic is not like that of modern wizards – instead his magic is like one of the wizards of old times – more turned toward healing and nature magic.

The last one was Harry. Lily had impression he would be the most peculiar and wanted to keep all surprises for the last moment.

Like his brothers before him, Harry was sedated and put on the platform. When the beam touched him, the first response were couple of completely white flashes of magic that went uniformly in all directions. Then several rays formed and started to move on the detecting surface.

Lily was prepared for many things, but this was not one of them.

"This is incredible Lily", said Selene, "the pattern of scattered rays is moving, it should be impossible – no known being or object has a moving pattern. Not only that, the combination of rays is showing uncharted ones. Look at the waves forming where the surface is hit, look at the system of runes it is starting to form."

Lily indeed noticed the runes and reacted quickly. "We need to get him out of there. The runes forming are about to negate magical isolation of the chamber."

So Harry's test was interrupted before yielding complete information. Still, something very important was discovered.

"Do you think the same thing Lily, darling?"

"Yes, I believe I do, Selene, darling. I think it was all reaction to him being isolated from outside magic. I also think we should get out from here as fast as possible. Merlin only knows what kind of magic he was attracting in this place."

"But do you see what this ability to adapt to magic means? And he did it unconsciously, this is his first accidental magic – he is only a week old, Lily!"

"This ability makes him the first and only magical computer in the known realities, and the most dangerous person. Luckily he was in the chamber when the reaction happened, that way no one noticed – otherwise we would have ended up being targeted by the Ministry for termination."

"Actually, I believe Minister Bagnold would be the least of our problems, we would probably be targeted by all magical communities and all muggle agencies."

"So, what do you suggest we should do?" asked Alice after listening to this exchange.

"For Neville and John everything is alright, but for Harry – I'm afraid we're going to have to lie to the coven. I understand your misgivings about this Alice, but trust us – in the matters such as this, even the honesty toward your family can become an indiscretion that will cost your and their life. It is the best we keep this between us and take unbreakables to completely secure the secret."

Later that evening the three women were sill under impression of the day's events and felt too uncomfortable to enjoy usual group pleasures the coven practiced, so all couples retired to their rooms.

"Honey, did anything happen today?" asked James.

"Nothing that wasn't expected dear. The boys are as would be expected for children born from such ritual – they are strong and their magic is mixture of ours. Still, we should be careful about Neville and Harry – the simple quick scan would yield they are squibs, whereas they have bigger cores than John."

"Well, I guess the only thing we can do is be careful so they have no problems at Hogwarts. Goodnight honey."

Lily entered the dreamscape thinking about the future. What is going to happen to the coven and the children?

Yes, she is definitely going to have more children with James – and maybe even with other males of the coven – she needed to find where the principal influence for Harry is coming from – she needed to have a daughter to fulfil her private agenda.

One could say that ever since Hogwarts Alice and Lily have been like sisters. Such pun is more than fitting, as it was at Hogwarts that young witches are recruited into one of the oldest secret societies – the Sisterhood.

"Do you think Harry might be the one the Old Order was looking for?" Alice asked her earlier.

"With magic anything is possible. However, in our line of work we have learnt of sufficient number of freakishly powerful beings to know magic can always grow more powerful. The quest for the ultimate being is just like the fight against wind-mills."

They were five women, appeared out of nowhere on the island of Avalon, off the Caledonian coast. After being cleared that they came with no malicious intent, they were put under the care of the Fay king Oberon. After the while they felt comfortable and start sharing their beliefs and speak of their voyage. They called themselves Bene Gesserit, their leader was Reverend Mother. It was established that in their world of origin the order that calls themselves Bene Gesserit was in the quest for the ultimate being. Although the man Paul Atreides showed incredible ability with spice travel, his arrogance made it that his challenge to come and look at the place where he was, could not remain unanswered.

This group broke the greatest taboo and used prohibited science to engineer the spice and go to that place which was forbidden to them. Their voyage took them much further than intended: spiritually all knowledge gained was useless as they could no longer adhere strictly to Bene Gesserit believes, and physically they are now in a different world with no possibility of return (even if they could they would be judged as traitors by other Bene Gesserit).

Therefore they started the New Order or the Sisterhood. Many of great and powerful witches, like Rowena Ravenclaw herself, were members of the Sisterhood. Revenclaw being a member led to Hogwarts becoming recruiting ground for the order.

The Sisterhood practiced the magic that was oriented by so-called female principles. Their popularity grew and they became political opponent to similar male organisation calling themselves Alchemists.

The silent war nearly created disastrous situation which could had lead to extinction of Wizards and Witches, until it was ended by the treason of Nicholas and Perenelle Flamel. The Flamels, who were deeply in love, shared their secrets and so became the most powerful magic practitioners of their time. Subsequent condemnation from both secret orders led to their hiding.

Of course, all plans Lily Potter was making were postponed by the conception ritual – until it was completed she could conceive no other children.

It was again Halloween and the Tonks again received the invitation from the Potter coven. This time Ted and Andromeda had thoroughly discussed the upcoming party. The last time they were surprised, and in retrospection believed they could have enjoyed themselves more if they were prepared. They decided to try doing it with other couples at the party – their fantasy menu for the evening was "all you can do magical species buffet".

Xenophilius Lovegood was a complete muggle, as muggle as they could possibly go – nothing supernatural what so ever. Which was not something this, exemplary son of university professors was happy about. You see, Lovegood came from a long line of university researchers who strongly believed there had to be something more to this world – their great passion were fairies, imaginary creatures and strange things – and therefore the name he was given by a family friend.

Though probability of stumbling on something strange is rather high, the world of magic prefers remaining hidden from the normal one. It is actually the first postulate of the occult: "Like many magicals who use regular humans as food and/or for reproduction, same can be said about magic in general, which feeds upon basic science. Therefore, in order to keep greatest part of its food unsoiled, magic remains hidden from what is called general public".

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending of your point of view), this state of things was not going to last for young Xenophilius. Like his great-uncle who went to Americas and got immense luck in becoming an assistant to Prof. Spiderwick, Mr. Lovegood decided to make a journey around the world in order to celebrate getting his doctoral degree at Oxford University. You see, there is the second postulate of the occult that says: "Families and people who get even slightly in contact with the supernatural, tend to get completely swallowed."

Like we said: Xenophilius "was" a complete muggle. Until he embarked on the last stage of his voyage and ended being "swallowed".

Lovegood's pilgrimage around the world to all places of legend like Stonehenge, Ayers Rock, Amazon forest, etc. was scheduled to end in the American North-West, place of many Native myths and legends. The young man should have been much more careful, but he just could not ignore the thrill of those stories he heard about this place – he just had to go to this forest at night. And night swallowed him as he entered a circle of trees.

Selene was such a happy woman. She had loving family, and she was married to the most tender and caring man in the world. Now she was sharing this miracle moment with her two coven sisters and gave birth to one of three baby girls that were now addition to the Potter coven. She watched as her husband held her girl with so much love in his eyes.

He was so happy. He couldn't believe his luck. When he ambushed that unsuspecting and careless fool in the woods he couldn't hope for the jack-pot he was getting. After all that was just an ordinary man. Fortunately that man had interesting contacts. At Oxford he had a colleague, this red-haired witch, who introduced him to her beautiful blonde friend – he had complete weakness for blonds. She had seer gift, but he could fool her in believing he was simply a wizard – and she loved clumsiness and simplicity of this man.

Marrying the blond goddess was just the beginning of his luck. The witch Lily came to them with this startling proposition, even for wizard standards: entering the Potter coven. And this was not only to be political alliance of magical families; this was proposition for reproductive coven – a true extended family. He had so much fun fucking five beautiful women – he was completely surprised by this Lily woman, all the pleasures she knew – it was impossible for ordinary woman to be that skilful, there had to be some symbiotic possession involved (like he was possessing Lovegood).

Those Halloween rituals were the pinnacle of pleasure one could dream of, and he surely totally enjoyed it. He completely let himself go, not only with those five women, but he also tried those special pleasures he could enjoy with four handsome men. Now he was father again, of this pretty blonde baby girl – Killer Bob was crying tears of happiness while holding his little Luna.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3 Before the storm

James Potter was enjoying clear and warm October day, a rarity in the British climate – more importantly, he was enjoying it with his family. The entire clan was now at Godric's Hollow, where one of smaller Potter mansions was located. Contrary to what was organised for first two steps of the ritual, where it was essential to have a large group of magically powerful people, the third step required intimate setting. The whole purpose of this part of the ritual is to show gratitude to various known and unknown entities that in their benevolent wisdom bestowed their gifts upon Potter coven and gave them six wonderful children. The purpose of the third ritual is also to show family love and respect of values to the same entities.

Godric's Hollow is a small community located near Tintagel. When in the darkest hour of the kingdom, Merlin himself and all knights of the Round Table were powerless in face of coming disaster, a wanderer called Potter appeared and saved the day and the future. For services he was awarded a piece of land near Tintagel – birthplace of King Arthur and a sacred city of Britons (one of seven gates to Avalon), so that a Potter could always be near heart of the kingdom. Later (few hundred years) the last of Merlin's apprentices chose to build a house and retire in a close-by valley (hollow), and so – as more and more people came to this beautiful countryside – the Potter property and the mansion became part of newly established mixed settlement of Godric's Hollow – where magical and mundane lived in harmony. Later when one of Gryffindor's descendants married into Potter family, Godric's cottage became Potter property and the place where Potter males traditionally threw away their virginity.

The family was having a picnic on the western lawn of the Potter mansion. This place was truly majestic, the beautiful mansion was located on a mount dominating the valley – it had both the view of the village and the valley on one side, and marvellous view of the ocean on the other side. Though the Potters moved their principal residence to East Anglia in order to be closer to new centre of power, heart of the Potters still remains in Tintagel countryside.

It was a beautiful day, and James let warmth spread through his soul as he watched Harry, Neville and John play with and tickle Luna, Jade and Ester – their baby sisters. At not even 15 months, the boys were already playing protective big brothers, and that amused the parents greatly. Still it was natural for the boys to feel that way – the three girls were so cute and beautiful.

Luna is promising to become stunning blonde beauty like her mother with gray and mesmerising eyes of Xenophilius – her sometimes far away look indicated inherited inner sight. James hoped she had inherited her mother's intellect and power, after all Selene and Lily are the highest ranked team of Unspeakable operatives. James was also able to notice some strange, quiet power about Xenophilius, something that caused the hairs on the back of his neck to stand, and that had nothing to do with sexual excitation the man was able to create in both women and men.

Jade is the perfect mixture of Asian beauty inherited from her mother and those incredible looks that are so specific to Black women, she is also likely to become deadly if her mother's proficiency in marital arts was any indication – that was one of reasons they were all happy to create the coven: their children would not only inherit their magical strength, but also their skills and knowledge. Lin Black is daughter of Emu and Yo Hinomura, her natural aura of darkness and nobility was the reason of Sirius' somewhat improved relations with his family.

Ester Lupin will grow into exquisite combination of Hungarian (her mother) and French (her father) beauty. After graduation, Remus Lupin made this trip around the world he had been planning since his third year and that life altering DADA lesson about lycanthropy – Prof. Lucian Garou had some quite unorthodox views on the matter compared to official Ministry position. One stage of his journey had brought him to Budapest, where Remus had chance to meet the most peculiar "Master of the City", the man – Michael Corvin was after all Head of several magical species, some like Vampires and Weres were thought to be completely incompatible. Michael had beautiful daughter Maritza, she was Remus' teacher about self-esteem of magical creatures that often had to suffer prejudices of the British Ministry. She was also Remus' teacher in the love arts as practiced by Vampires and Weres.

James was feeling more and more restless by the day. They were fast approaching end of the ritual that would complete this magical construction. He surely hoped nothing would cause trouble; lives of their children were at stake. The crushing feeling in his heart was partially lifted thanks to the party organised on September 1st. It was the 20th anniversary of the Marauders, and James was happy to receive in his home his lost brother-in-crime, Peter Pettigrew, and also those who were mentors to the Marauders: Fabian and Gideon Prewitt.

Unfortunately James was unable to enjoy these moments of happiness, as the escalating conflict with the "Dark Lord Voldemort" was shrouding Wizarding World in a climate of fear and violence.

Colder mornings reminded him of the coming winter and of the last year's December tragedy. He couldn't believe that someone whose music brought so much beauty and happiness to the world could be shot in the back by some crazy bastard looking to justify his miserable existence by some random act of madness. He felt that strange feeling of loss and being lost in the world where in spite of magic madness was so widespread. Maybe it is because of magic that this world is so filled with madness in the first place.

History had proved it on many occasions: Instead of powerful, superior beings, as wizards liked to consider themselves, they were actually more like clueless children who were given the power of a nuclear bomb.

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Once upon a time, in times so remote they represented distant past to even such old civilisations like Atlantis and Empire of Mu, there was a Fay kingdom of Ararat, covering territory of Armenian Highlands; its capital was located somewhere on the slopes of the mountain. That city was truly majestic and fear-inducing sight: huge and powerful black citadel that contrasted with eternal snows of the mountain top, strong impregnable walls, tall elegant towers, and multitude of beautiful gardens and palaces.

Fays are heterogeneous group of beings of various shapes and sizes. These could be considered as belonging to completely different species: Faeries, Leprechauns, Pixies, various shape shifters, etc. One could even apply adjective "animal" to some, while using "vegetal" with others. The term Fay is actually word of Human language used to designate all those secretive, lesser known beings, whose magic is associated with light, life, wilderness and nature.

Fays live in large communities. These cities are often independent and ruled by a king or a queen, as Fays tend to follow those who are magically strongest. A ruler is usually helped by a council of elders. It is also interesting to note that Fays freely accept other nations into their communities like Elves, Goblins, etc. and through history it was often the case that Fay ruler also rules Elfish or Goblin nation, the latest example being king Jareth.

The old kingdom of Ararat was special as it covered large territory, and also in those times Humans were accepted into the kingdom and several settlements were under Ararat's protection. In those time Humans were barely much different than other primates and word Human designated mixture of species (Neanderthals, Sapiens, etc. – of course Humans of that time had no notion of species). And of course, in those times, Humans knew nothing of magic.

Even though Fays are powerful wielders of magic and have developed all sorts the likes of which a human mind could hardly begin to grasp, they also have their gods and goddesses or other spiritual leading entities.

Now let us return to the story of the old kingdom of Ararat. It actually revolves around three protagonists. As this story was later picked up by Humans and placed in their myths and legends, we will use the names given by Humans: Gilgamesh, Ishtar and Enkidu (you are right – this is Sumerian legend, but that is where inaccuracy lies – the story is actually older and different).

Ishtar was powerful magical being and goddess-protector of Ararat kingdom. Her temple was located in the centre of the city; it was enormous ziggurat with tall tower on the top. Fays have extremely long life-spans (ca. 500-1000 years), but even by Fay standards Ishtar was considered immortal, unbelievably powerful, and thus a goddess.

Every Ararat ruler was spiritual servant to the goddess. Gilgamesh was young king and was new ruler of kingdom after his parents had passed away. He was beautiful and his magic was powerful. The goddess wanted more than just spiritual service, and that led to an affair.

Things were further complicated by the fact that Fays get easily friendly with other species. Gilgamesh's best friend and blood-brother was Enkidu, whose particularity was to be one of first Homunculi – artificial Humans. When Gilgamesh went to one of his many hunting expeditions in the stony desert that was bordering the kingdom, he found completely naked Enkidu, with no memories, walking in very cold weather across rocks and hard dirt. It was clear Enkidu was no ordinary Human. Through their adventures Enkidu and Gilgamesh became best friends and brothers.

Though he usually avoided spiritual ceremonies, it was one of those days Enkidu's heart was full of life's joy and he wanted to sing, to sing that special music Fay priests performed in the temple.

In the Great Hall of passed Kings laid their bodies frozen in stasis, waiting for their minds to finally be at piece so they could finally cross to the other world and dissolve their bodies. This hall used to be central piece of the temple where service was performed, but now it was only the place where king would invoke the goddess and they would move to the inner chamber. In the inner chamber was now installed large fluffy bed covered in transparent drapes.

Priests were singing hymns while the king pronounced the sacred formula.

The air shifted and there, the goddess was standing. She walked seductively up to Gilgamesh.

"Hello darling. What beautiful sunset we have today, I hope your day was as good as mine. And it seems it's only getting better. Music is perfect as always, you sure know how to please a goddess and we are not even in the serious business yet" she said with heavy innuendo.

Gilgamesh was starting to like more and more her games, and even when she behaved like complete slut (she was, after all, goddess of sex and femininity) he could only feel love. He started to love her so much that when alone he was constantly thinking about what possible future they could have together. He was glad he could enjoy Enkidu's company when that hard feeling was pushing on his heart. But in this moment none of his fears mattered anymore.

He covered Ishtar in his embrace and they enjoyed that intimate moment when after separation their magic started to mix.

This evening, this feeling was even more intoxicating than usually. Their magic was behaving differently, more powerful, promising great heights and unbelievable pleasures. Even the goddess was stunned and lost. Something was making her feel like an innocent girl instead of goddess of love and sex.

And then they could understand it. It was music that brought new shapes to their magic, and there was a new voice this evening. This voice was actually equally surprised as they were, because Enkidu sure didn't think that service changed that much since the old king passed away – now he understood why his friend was so secretive about his new responsibilities – many Fay princesses are going to be mighty disappointed when the word gets out about spiritual service practiced in Ararat.

Enkidu suddenly found himself being the sole object of Ishtar's attention. Under her look, he felt like being examined by a bunch of healers trying to determine whether a patient can be cured. Quickly he felt even more awkward; his best friend was also watching him intently. Gilgamesh felt that music was different, but he worried what Ishtar may be able to see.

One of things Ishtar could see in Enkidu was strong magic of life and death. Both were floating in his soul in a strange equilibrium dance, something about that dance reminded her of her own dance with Gilgamesh. Still she was goddess of Fay and felt great temptation to just kill on the spot this abomination. However, this 'man' was also able to do something to the magic of love and make it infinitely better, and he was also best friend of Gilgamesh. If she would kill Enkidu, she would likely have to share some of her deeper secrets, secrets a goddess would never reveal to a servant. Her mind was heavy thinking about options. Two men were also deeply in thought and waiting, knowing that it would ultimately all be her decision.

What went from that moment on is part of the legend. Enkidu became special part of the ceremony and was singing not in the Great Hall, but in the inner chamber. Ishtar and Gilgamesh could completely abandon themselves to intoxicating magic, and soon it got better as Enkidu's music was influenced by how he saw them, and what they received was each time more intoxicating.

This led to only possible outcome that wouldn't put kingdom in danger: Gilgamesh, Ishtar and Enkidu became a threesome. Never again was in history a city better protected than Ararat was during that period when the games the threesome played charged the wards of the citadel.

The games they played and all experiments the three had done provoked what would be the lucky accident and make of the three the first reproductively successful threesome in history. They were testing various techniques, often involving magic, and how these techniques influenced their magic and pleasure. Gilgamesh and Enkidu were on that enormous bed kissing and caressing each other, concentrated on mixing their magic. Gilgamesh let his wings of light spring, while Enkidu began to hum a new melody. Later they were joined by a sensation of being caressed by air itself, and soon Ishtar materialised herself between them. As they entered her, Enkidu became part-water and his member became one with Gilgamesh's, and all three of them mixed their magic while caressing each other a making pleasure grow to yet unreached levels.

When the three woke up they were completely clueless how long they had made love and how long they had slept. Check of their health showed that something was different about Ishtar. You know all those stories about gods impregnating mortal girls and goddesses getting pregnant, given the number of those stories it may seem like ordinary event now, but then it was huge, unthinkable – beings that were considered gods never knew or understood what pregnancy was. So naturally when Ishtar found that she possessed a fully functional womb, it was almost fainting-level news (I say almost because no matter what, she is still freakishly powerful goddess).

Now what came as a surprise is that pregnancy progressed as completely normal Human pregnancy. Nine months later a baby girl was born, she was all cute and beautiful, and joy of her three parents.

Little girl was beautiful like some surreal light was shining upon her. She was named Moon Princess, and all starting from her parents to priests and elders were impatient to see what would be her magic.

Little princess was treasured by the entire city. Unfortunately changes started to happen, like her skin looking the same as Enkidu's. It was clear that girl had all magic her parents possessed. Soon pressure on Ishtar was too much and she couldn't take care of her child anymore – she started to feel the same killer instincts she felt towards Enkidu.

Ishtar was worried, what kind of being was her daughter? Of course she loved her, but nevertheless, this could create breach of many secrets of the gods and other superior beings.

The king had found a teacher and caretaker for his daughter. He was an old man, of unknown origin, who long time ago came to the city. His wisdom was legendary among inhabitants of the city, and although not a show-off, his powerful magic was respected. The man called himself Prometheus.

Prometheus was a mysterious being, considered as the first Alchemist, managing to blend transfiguration art of the Fays and science of the Elves. He was respected as a wise teacher, and given his magic he could easily become one of the elders, but like Enkidu he was a stranger in this land and even though Fays offer their friendship and open their families easily, it is not easy to gain high administrative positions for those not born into the land.

The old man was enjoying one of those calm days in the palace garden, when she came to play. He quietly observed her games, until finding what he was looking for.

"Hello little girl"

"Hello grandfather"

"This is the first time I see you play here. What is your name?"

"My mother calls me 'little trouble' and my fathers call me 'little treasure'."

"Fathers, eh? Than you must be Moon Princess" the little girl nodded. "Would you like me to show you the games I play?"

"But old men aren't supposed to play"

"Quite the opposite my child, old men were once young and learnt many games"

And so Prometheus began to teach Moon Princess. When she was of age he brought her again to the garden and he spoke:

"Child, after crossing countless ages, one thing is certain: you are the only being I would call my equal. Not even your mother and those like her can be compared to me, but those are part of my secrets and her secrets. You know that it is the first rule of magic – secrets. Everything is full of secrets. Secrets that you keep, secrets that you need to uncover to gain knowledge. I have taught you all of my knowledge that you needed to know and you are now ready to walk you own adventure. You are ready to create your own secrets. Now you are old to have a special name that will guide your quest. I will call you Pandora – the one that has all the gifts."

And so the princess started her own quest. She understood that magic was everywhere in multitude of forms. It wasn't something that was privilege of gods and Fays and other magical beings over non-magical creatures.

Those who thought the princess would create shocking changes were never even close. Like all Fays the princess is naturally friendly to all beings: Elves, Goblins, Humans, Demons, etc. She has this strange power like Enkidu, only even stronger that is like flow of fundamental magic – only more raw and wild than anything Fays ever experienced. She can move things, hear thoughts, be faster and stronger, and command the elements. And all that is coupled with Fay power and the power of goddess.

And her control of magic is spectacular, all the things she can see in nature and about its structure.

The shock that brought attention of everybody from entire Fay nation to all known superior beings on the city of Ararat was the apparition of magical Humans in the settlements that surrounded the city. Thorough examination brought only one possible culprit for the situation: the princess. It still remains unknown how exactly the gift was given to Humans. It seems that the princess managed to enlist the help of her principal tutor Prometheus.

This was the start of the Great Magical Conflict. It opposed the Fay and their Elfish and Goblin allies who wanted to share and develop magic as freely as possible, against the Gods and other beings from the higher planes of existence who wanted their food to remain ignorant and their servants obedient.

The Gods crushed the rebellion, the city of Ararat was destroyed, and Prometheus imprisoned and chained to the solitary remaining tower on the mountain top. Pandora escaped and for millennia remained hidden, but never letting go of her dreams – dreams of a world where all magic is free. In complete secrecy she would become the first Goddess of the Humans and their "Protecting Mother", the one who bestowed upon mankind the "Gift" so that mankind could fight various predators (both magical and non-magical).

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Sybil was enjoying her drink and beautiful view of Sidney Cove. About a week ago her life went through some unsuspected fundamental changes (yeah, those usually are unsuspected). She, the grand-daughter of Cassandra Trelawney: the Seer extraordinaire was few years out of Hogwarts and jobless. She desperately wanted to live up to her grand-mother's name and expectations family and friends were having in regards to her gift and her future. Unfortunately as the time passed all she managed is to get a reputation of a charlatan.

On that gloomy July Monday, that promised nothing but even more depression for poor Sybil, she was suddenly rewarded with a lucky break. There in "the Daily Prophet" was not one, but two job offers for seer position: one was for Divination professor at Hogwarts school, the other was for fortune teller position in a travelling circus.

Representatives of the travelling circus were right there in London, so Sybil decided to try her luck there.

Like in the muggle world, travelling circuses are often treated with the same disrespect among wizards, like Succubi brothels, these establishments were usually simply tolerated by wizards. Circuses are blatant violations of the secrecy code (so precious to European Ministries) and therefore are not treated with particular kindness. For that reason all public performers usually avoid Europe.

Public performance originates from Indian sub-continent, where even today among artists, yogis and fakirs of mundane origin – true magicians can be seen. There are multitude of places right in the middle of great human cities where magic is openly performed, but not recognised; where magical creatures walk among you, but are not seen. These are places developing all sorts of parallel magical arts. For that reason there are certain wizard trades that hold circuses in great respect – and seers are such trade.

Job interview was to be held in a luxurious muggle hotel room – where representatives of the travelling circus had taken their lodgings, while waiting for their equipment to transit through British magical space and be directed to Australia. The troupe decided they would move from the US and go "Down-Under" for their new tour. For that reason they had to transit through London as magical communities of the Commonwealth are under British Ministry jurisdiction. Fortunately, mixed magical culture of Australia insured the troupe wouldn't suffer the prejudices of the British community.

Sybil entered a classy building. After stating her business at the reception, she was led by a well dressed bellhop to a penthouse suite. This particular circus had a sort of reputation among Carnies, and even in Wizarding World. This troupe had aura of some special magic about them.

After a short wait in the antechamber, Sybil was called to enter the salon. She was greeted by two men, one was a middle-aged gentleman who presented himself as Lars Jones, and the other looked as being of Dwarf ancestry, but without a bushy beard and the other gentleman presented him as Mr. Samson, the co-director of the establishment.

Sybil was offered a comfortable arm-chair facing a double seat couch. Behind the couch was a wooden screen and Sybil could sense there was a third person, probably the other co-director, who was probably the main partner thought Sybil.

During the interview Sybil showed great intuition and avoided making unnecessary drama in her performance. Nevertheless, she was hoping to have a chance to present her true gift regretting once again that it was so random. Suddenly she was starting to feel beginning of the psychic wave.

Lars and Samson liked the performance they were seeing. This candidate would blend perfectly with the troupe, and she looked like archetype of fortune teller. She was able to act which was a plus in their book, they only needed to see what was her true gift and they could pronounce themselves. They saw the woman going still and her look getting empty.

In a deep voice Sybil started saying: "The One with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches… Born as the seventh month dies. Born to those who have trice defied him… And the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal… And he will have power the Dark Lord knows not….Either must die at the hand of the other, for neither can live while the other survives… The One with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches as the seventh month dies…"

Lars and Samson went pale and the person behind the screen shouted "Impossible! Mrs. Hawkins was Omega, the cycle was supposed to end with her!" It was followed by quick muttering or the person: "Of course that explains why we are still alive Samson. And that also explains why that Navajo shaman directed us to Australia."

Sybil collected herself and immediately apologised "Oh, I'm so sorry! I often have these blackouts!" Lars quickly saved her from launching into a ramble "Think nothing of it Madam. Please, Mr. Samson heard enough and is quite pleased. You are hired Madam."

Mr. Samson then added "There is only one thing we should warn you about: our previous fortune teller, Mrs. Hawkins was very much loved by members of the troupe, and some members don't like that we are hiring her replacement so soon after her passing." Lars then reassured her "We will however, do what is necessary to make your stay most pleasurable."

Sybil was ecstatic. She had a job. The people she would be working with were pleasant, and the circus looked classy enough so that travelling would be pleasant. She received an air ticket for Sydney, where they would meet in two weeks time to start the tour after all administration stuff was completed.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4: The betrayal

Dusk has just begun to settle. Predators of the day retired to their dwellings and those of the night were not yet out, it was the safest time for certain species. Gently the grass moved a bit, as if only moved by the breeze. The moment later, carefully appearing at the edge of the clearing, a rodent lifted its head and checked the surroundings. As it seemed happy with the confirmed assessment that there was no one in the vicinity, it quickly jumped and made a sprint along the country road that crossed the property towards the mansion.

Sky above Little Hangleton was covered in thick layer of clouds and the darkness was complete, this evening at least he didn't have to worry about owls and such – thought the rat. The mission was success and his master would reward him, or at least he would avoid being treated like a Malfoy house-elf.

He ran through his usual hole in the wall, then towards the stairs that descended into deep subterranean vault. On the deepest level he came in front of the entrance to oubliettes. He changed into his human form and spoke the password. He let himself be scanned by security system, and when he was cleared there was magical shimmer on the doors.

He entered the Dark Lord's secret layer. A guard directed him to the waiting room, before he would be received to make his report. While waiting he was thinking of the prize he would receive for precious services; after all, he was the only one capable to safely approach James Potter.

"Wormtail!", he heard the call from the Lord's private chambers, and he swiftly entered.

Not for the first time in the last month, thoughts of Peter Pettigrew went to the man who gave him his nick-name, the man whose death he was about to bring. Once again he almost laughed of his good luck. When he bid good-bye to the Marauders after the graduation, he thought he was saying final fare well to this period of his life as he was to follow family tradition and enter the service of some rich pure-blood that represented nobility of the Wizarding world. For a while he was hoping that it would be the Potters, but James just had to be so damn tradition-breaking. When he entered service of the man calling himself Lord Voldemort, it was only out of the lack of employment, and he couldn't believe he did it: "Oh for Merlin's staff, not another would-be 'Dork' Lord!" However, he was happy to discover how wrong he was. Although of uncertain lineage, Voldemort behaved every bit as pure-blood stereotype – he was a parselmouth and pretended to be Heir of Slytherin. For Voldemort style was a weapon as much as his magical strength. Voldemort was also very powerful and ruthless in applying that power. Peter was completely extatic when he understood there were no bounds of moral or other nature, to what his new Master was ready to do in the name of victory. And now Peter was able to render speacial services, and maybe his new Master would offer him to be part of the family – family like he used to have with James Potter.

Voldemort's underground apartment could best be described as luxurious loft. His private chambers were composed of a relaxation area with a swimming pool and all other accessories Dark Lord of his standing could desire, an office area that contained large library and a laboratory that could be used for potions or other magical experiments as well as muggle engineering, and a dining area where some of above mentioned elves were preparing Dark Lord's meals – courtesy of Lucius Malfoy.

When Peter entered the Dark Lord was enjoying his usual evening dip.

"Wormtail! Robe me."

Peter hurried to obey towards the stairs descending into the pool.

"Couldn't you wait that I get out of the water?" – and Peter received hit to the head.

Peter Pettigrew was a perfect henchman, albeit sometimes overly eager to serve. His position within "Inner Circle" was more secured with each service he performed for the Dark Lord: the Lestranges were fanatics and enforcers, Malfoy was tasked to insure financial back-up and provide the luxury, Peter was a go-for, and Snape was a spy. These six are the only ones who could even remotely pretend to have Voldemort's trust (if he could even trust anybody). All others like simply deluded themselves into believing to be of greater importance than they truly were – that was one of Voldemort's strengths.

"Lately it's getting increasingly difficult to put my plans into motion Peter, without stumbling on those pesky Potters. I'm beginning to understand the warning of Abraxas Malfoy about them – its quite unbelievable that such 'Light' family has so many connections in the underworld. Albus Dumbeldore is an adversary I can fight head-on, but with the Potters I can't even hire sufficient number of thugs to pull my moves without sacrificing precious number of Death Eaters. I also completely understand Snape's hatred toward the man; he and Black are quite anoying with thier Auror team. That's why I'm sure you understand you have my undivided attention for your report."

"Well the mission to plant the bugging device went according to the plan my Lord. I swear the fool was so happy to meet us again. Although that Lily Evans was always able to send shivers down my spine even though she's a filthy mudblood. Your source sure knows his wards and runes if I was able to safely enter that fortress."

"Indeed, remind me to send him my thanks the next time Lucius goes to the Ministry. So what have you and Snape gathered on your stake out."

"You won't beleive your luck my Lord. That Black mutt formed coven with James Potter; he must have been pretty depresed when his family kicked him out. And to believe that Potter went with it; his ancestors must be turning into ectoplasm. Anyhow, what is great is that the Blacks, the Potters and the Longbottoms will be celebrating Samhain together at Godric's cottage, that place almost has no wards. That's about all we could get, there was some strange interference and the device quickly went out."

"That's rather meager result Wormtail considering all the efforts that went into this operation, I'm half-tempted to Crucio you into the next year. However, you are right and this is a great oportunity and so I will spear you this time."

"Thank you my Lord, you know I faithfully serve you!" said Peter quickly.

"Enough! Just remove your foul presence, I have much planning to do with the information you brought me."

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Petunia just couldn't believe how much her life had changed in the past years. At some point it all seemed to go down the drain so she completely lost track of how many times it made 180 degree turns.

She used to be happily engaged to Vernon Dursley, a man who was so normal and far from the Wizarding world that she happily looked forward to spend rest of her life away from all that madness. She was quite fond of the man and against her fears she decided to confide in Vernon and share the secret of her supernatural heretage. After all their children could one day be magical and Vernon deserved the truth.

Unfortunately the very day she was to break the news over dinner, after coming home from the market, she descovered Vernon's body in the bath tub. It was all made to look as a suicide.

She was absolutely devastated. Was there any reason Vernon would want to end his life? No, they were too happy together. Did Vernon have some enemies? Police couldn't point to any of his aquintnces as that dangerous as to engage a hit against Vernon, and Vernon Dursley was so completely ordinary person – Assistant Director at Grunnings, graduated from Smeltings. If there ever was someone who personified ordinary British middle-class man, then Vernon was that man. Everything pointed to suicide, and that was illogical.

And then all Petunia felt was self-loathing; she just couldn't believe she was so careless. It was one of first lessons they learnt as Spinners – never let your senses go down, world of magic is dangerous. And she was about to bring Vernon in on the secret.

But none of the Spinners she knew would pull such a low blow – killing a precious person in order to pass her the message that with her new lifestyle she became careless about possible dangers.

Official books of the Ministry have listed the community of Spinner´s End as muggle one. However this is one of those examples of blatant wizarding ignorance, for those official books simply list where witches and wizards had been detected, and at this moment the only Wizarding citizens detected in this community are Severus Snape and Elaine Snape, née Prince.

Spinners, as that is how they refer to themselves, are actually heterogenous community of magic users of various origins and species – although they all seem perfectly human and muggle. That was exactly what Elaine Prince thought when she met Tobias Snape.

The Princes where among those old pureblood families who were not as lucky as the Potters to pass through the Great Plague relatively unscathed, and were on constant decline since formation of the Ministry. Many of those declining families in order to fight the growing influence of the Malfoys and other Nouveaux Riches resorted to employing amorentia on the heirs of local rich muggle families. At first it seemed the Princes were unlucky even in that regard. Until Elaine Prince had the chance to bump against a man right in front of 'Leeaky Cauldron', and that man was both young and had classy presentation. They felt instant attraction to each other and Tobias initiated the courtship procedure.

To him she was just another magical user. To her he was just another muggle and she used amorentia. She was absolutely bouncing with happiness when she saw the splendor of Snape manor at Spinner's End.

One of the things that unite this community is complete dispise of Wizarding government that took upon themselves to rule over all magical humans and those they call 'half-breeds' without taking the notice of other forms of magic but the one they use themselves.

After one year and a half, Tobias' mind was free of amorentia for the first time. For some reason those arrogant witches were convinced that a man couldn't say no to them, and usually after a child was born they interrupted drug-feeding. He quickly understood what had happened and berated himself for beeing so carless, after all he was Chief of the community. What made things even worse Elaine registered their son for Hogwarts and a Wizarding official was also able to detect two other 'Wizarding' children in their community: Petunia and Lily Evans, the daughters of Tobias' blood brother Who Evans, officially called Hugh Evans. Tobias was absolutly furious, he was angry at himself, he was angry at Elaine, and he was angry that Severus came into the world before effects of amorentia cleared from his mind. And poor Severus was reminded all his child-hood why his father hated him, the only consolation Severus received while playing with two girls from the neighborhood who became his like his sisters.

Who Evans was one of those peculiar Spinners who only looked human, but in fact was not. Who Evans was dubbed Time Lord by his people he left far away from this Earth. He was among those alien explorers who after crossing countless galaxies, and having superior life span chose to settle on Earth, finding that magic here offered far greater possibilities than anywhere else.

Before completely settling as a father of family, Time Lord still had many adventures here on Earth, regarding combined flow of time and magic.

This portion of space-time that we call our home was unfortunately also the stage of the Great Conflict that oposed those Gods and Superior beings who wanted to share knowledge and power with lower beings and thus offer better conditions of evolution for both Gods and those lower species, and Gods who wanted to keep secrets for themselves and continue exploiting lower beings and feeding off their faith.

Among many companions Time Lord met on his journeys, his favourite people were Tobias Snape, Rose Evans and Hag Irina. During several of his missions, Time Lord needed help of Spinners, who held ability to move some forms of magic in certain ways that were particulry helpful to Time Lord. After meeting their community and seeing that there were also some other alien explorers among them, he chose to settle there and keep the guard on this world. Tobias became his blood brother and Rose his wife. Rose and Who became parents of a beautiful girl named Petunia.

On one of his missions Who was obliged to build his second person and send it on a different mission while continuing to pursue his goals. That proved to have far more consequences than he was able to imagine at the time. The Second Doctor went to Yalta of the 12th century, there he was supposed to meet a person with ability to help him resolve the battle among the Others. On Yalta he met three individuals, the Norns – they had the ability to wield destiny of men, and could thus help settle the conflict of the Others concerning men's free choice of Light and Darkness and question of an Other with 'ultimate' power.

Three Norns are very revered among magic users, particulary in communities connected to Druids, or among the Witches of the Green Way. Druids revered them as Three Sisters. The Witches called them Three Mothers.

The Norns practiced what is called transfering reproduction. After finding suitable candidate or cadidates, these would be captured and forced to mate with the Norns. Each Norn would give birth to a girl and this girl would first be aprentice to her mother and later mother would transfer and merge her being with her daughter's. Norns thus had inteligence and memories of countless generations.

Although these women were called Hags or Crones, truth was quite the oposite. The Second Doctor discovered that Norns should be named Three MILFs. Irina was especially explosive combination of heavenly looks and cutting personality she partly inherited from her many times great-grandmother Circe.

Thanks to Irina the Doctor was able to form barter with Norns. They would help him, and he would father their girls. About a year after his successful mission with the Others, three girls were born. Unfortunately girls inherited more from the Doctor than Norns were looking for and three girls merged into one baby. That called for extra-ordinary assembly of looking through the crystal ball that was their eye into the abyss of unknown. And it was decided that they would transfer themselves into little girl right away and let the Doctor take them on the Next Great Adventure.

Thus one morning Who Evans was meeting his other self who gave him his daughter to raise and merged back with him. Rose was very understanding and accepted Lily as her own – she and Petunia would both be thought ways of the Spinners. However, Who and Rose decided he would avoid creating more of himself in the future.

Petunia and Lily were growing up in loving family and cherished each other's company.

The Doctor could understand how Tobias felt, and knew the hatred was not directed toward the boy, but toward Tobias himself who as leader of community should have been more vigilant with other magic users. The Doctor decided to open his home to poor Severus Snape and offer love and care to the boy that needed them so much.

Unfortunately the happiness of that little family was shadowed by the events that hit London Metropolitan area in the winter and the spring of 1957 – a series of child abductions and killings, a majority of whom were little girls.

The Press was already starting to dub this case a more gruesome version of Jack the Ripper, when Lily Evans disappeared. She was last seen drawing in the school yard during the break before her last lessons of that day. The weather was clear and warm, and spring sun shined its promises for a long, hot summer, just like that first school year was promise of a lifetime of adventures to an unsuspecting little girl.

Commissioner Doyle of Scotland Yard was patient and methodic man. Many had found his approach unorthodox, especially his interest in the occult. Many of his colleagues thought he would finally hit the dust for taking sabatical year to attend Oxford Occult, but entire establishment was uterly shocked to see Sir Archibald Croaker act in his favour. Result, he was named Commissioner instead of respectfully being thanked for his services and getting an early retirement.

When Doyle arrived to the village of Spinner's End his first impression of the place was: "Oh Lord, not another 'Village of the Damned'". He had a gut feeling there was some stigma on the community, but for the sake of saving the girl's life he prefered not to unnecessarily push the things where they shouldn't be pushed.

Doyle was approached right away by the father, Hugh Evans with an offer to give all help he would be able. Doyle's first impression of the man was that he was of incredibly sharp mind, someone who could be dead useful on the force in the Yard, or even better with Croaker's Unspeakables. For a moment Doyle thought he became victim of 'Commissioner's curse' – there was a belief in the Yard that for the last hundred years every Commissioner eventually finds his 'Sherlock Holmes', an independent consultant who gets to be his partner in investigations. However, Doyle noticed there was an uncanny number of sharp witted people in this community and they all worked as a family trying to save one of their own, he noticed the particular zeal displayed by Tobias Snape to help in the matters, and also that everybody looked up to the man for comfort in this dark hour for their village. The reaction Doyle recieved during investigation was that entire village was shocked that a child from their community could be kidnapped from the local school – they were all like a big family and would never even unintentionnally endanger a child's life, let alone bring serious harm. That ment that the culprit was not from the community, but that made things impossible as there were no travellers going through the village in years.

Doyle accepted the help of Hugh and Tobias, and they picked up victim's files from other cases and started regrouping common occurences.

-All victims were between 6 and 8 in their first year of elementary school. Only two were boys.

-All victims were kidnapped at their school. Professors and other staff were there for years.

-All bodies were discovered in abandoned buildings or that served as storage space.

-There were periodical crime waves of child disappearence in the same areas roughly spaced 70 years going back to Restauration period.

-All schools were in old buildings. After the war the same architecture bureau carried out reconstruction work where there was damage.

-All buildings once belonged to the same man, Francis Palladin, the King's counsellor during Restauration. He leged part of his buildings to be transformed into schools or orphanages.

-The only difference was the school in Spinner's End where the building bilonged to Palladin's alleged mistress, Lady Angelique Douée Marquise of Astraté. Also this area was never before part of any of previous crime waves.

Spinner's End was a yound community of about fifty years. The Spinners were previously nomadic community, often wrongly believed to be of Gipsy origin by sedentery people. Tobias was now starting to believe that his father was swindeled into accepting the deal for aquisiton of the land that was now village of Spinner's End. Tobias Snape thought there had to be some curse on the luck of Snape's men.

Palladin was a non-magical (Doyle refused to employ the term 'muggle' he heard from Croaker, it seemed like an insult – even though nobody and nothing is completely non-magical). He also heard, after giving his report to Croaker, that Palladin's name was already known to Croaker as the man was follower and had studied works of the famous alchemist Rombaldi, the one who established foundations of modern alchemy and the last true alchemist.

Rombaldi was rumoured to have discovered incredible magical treasures, even worlds beyond great Nicolas Flamel. It was believed that Rombaldi applied revolutionary new insight on alchemy knowledge and discovered stunningly simple and elegant formulas for previously hardly understandable formulas. In fact it was believed that his discoveries were so beyond anything imaginable that they were origin of the Great Plague that almost wiped Wizarding world.

Rombaldi was Croaker´s great passion. It was a sort of enygma that every true Unspeakable dreamed of testing hers or his witts on. Croaker's dream was to be able to descover the key to Rombaldi's research and return the Wizarding world to its previous glory. He hoped one of Rombaldi's followers or people who have previously studied his works might have discovered something that remained hidden. Palladin himself had very curious reputation and Croaker believed that this man was probably Rombaldi's closest follower. That is until he found some sources indicating that it was Lady Angelique that initiated Palladin. It was rather logical – sources indicated that she like Palladin was non-magical, but had uncanny understanding of all things magical. Her name was even today respected among many magical creatures throughout Europe, although Unspeakables couldn't find suitable explanation why.

The investigation came to an unexpected breakthrough when Commissaire Doyle discovered that janitors of several schools were actually the same man who gave false names and provided perfect forgeries upon entering the service. It was discovered that he was working for the architecture bureau that restaured the schools or issued order that some be closed and transformed into storage spaces. The man's mother was Director in the architecture firm and was also able to give forged identity and be placed on a Committee that selected which firm would get the job to reconstruct all the buildings that needed to be. That woman was also herself a victim of kidnapping 70 years ago.

Doyle and his team were quickly able to understand that Palladin used what Hugh Evans called 'perverted form of transfering reproduction'. Palladin was able to divise a way to transfer his intelligence and personality into a young child using muggle way. Very quckly he started to prefer being a woman who would later give birth to children who would become her assistants in crime. The trio was quickly able to discover the woman's trail and bring the series of crimes to an end. Unfortunately the girl they rescued at Palladin's place was not Lily Evans.

However, by some providential miracle one morning, just like the years ago, Hugh and Rose discovered Lily on their doorstep, she was unharmed and was unable to remember what so ever. All scans were unable to give any information to what kind of treatment she was subjected to.

Everything seemed to be well again. But something about Lily was starting to freak out Petunia and created akward atmosphere between sisters. The chasm between the three children continue to grow as they attended Hogwarts.

After meeting a muggle man who was in the service of Unspeakables, Hugh and Tobias mellowed somewhat about an idea of cooperating with Wizards and sending their children to Hogwarts. Tobias decided that Severus would no longer bear the load of his own mistakes.

Also an event that was suppose to be a joke as far as Doyle was concerned, brought consequences to the destiny of three young people. Because of some gut feeling, the Commissioner wanted to apply certain test on the children that he suspected were magical, but didn't want to push the issue with the community.

There was the test proposed by one of senior members of Unspeakables, called the Rockwood-Von Richter test. The Rockwoods were one of the darkest families of Wizarding world. They knew and practiced obscure magic and were ruthless about achieving their goals. It was rumoured that Senior Director Rockwood shares Croaker's passion for Rombaldi, and where Croaker used detective work to pursue his passion, The Rockwoods used literal hands on the meat method. Senior Director Rockwood's cousin – junior technician Rockwood used to work for certain Prof. Von Richter, who himself was in the service of Grindelwald.

Von Richter's goal was to create army of Homunculi that would infiltrate muggle world. His approach was not to use direct means to creat grown up specimens, but to use bio-engineering and create babies that would be trained to perfectly blend and be dormant agents until their services were needed. Junior technician Rockwood designed a test that would evaluate children's potential to be good agents – he even went so far away as to create completely general version capable to measure any child regardless of its magical or biological origins. Senior Director Rockwood wanted to start applying this test through the Wizarding world, because there was a series of parchments from Rombaldi describing the venue of particularly powerful witch.

Although Croaker was firmly against such methods, he wanted to use this oportunity where in controled environment and in complete secret from other Unspeakables he could test few children he suspected were magical and see what was degree of danger represented by Rockwood – after all Croaker knew Rockwood had contacts with the Centre of Blue Cove, Denver where muggle organisation proposed kidnapping gifted children and turning them into perfect agents.

The test itself was innocent enough: a series of games – puzzles, IQ tests, playing to assemble or disassemble a toy gun and other weapons, there were also physical games where strength and reflexes were tested and games to test gift for martial arts and the ease to learn to kill, and there were the test to evaluate proficiency with various forms of magic, emotional state and to test personality of the suject.

"Hello boss. Don't say my name. Here is my recommendation for the tourist tour.

Your interest in the petrified forest was extremely well justified.

The three dwarves are indeed incredibly promissing. The boy and older girl are exceptional, but younger girl could only be described as off the charts and completely unknown waters. Her results are unbelievable even compared to the No6 of the original players of the game who hereself was described as rare gem by the creators of the game."

"Thank you my boy. I can hardly wait for your return and to hear all the details."

That is how it was decided that all three children would attend Hogwarts. Severus would naturally follow the programme for half-blood Wizards with encouriging of contact with pure-bloods. Petunia's level of wizard magic would deem that she follows the Squib programme even if she officially came from non-magical family. In face of Lily's exceptional results it was decided she would follow pure-blood programme and be suitably guided through her education by the Sisterhood. The Gray Lady would offer liason between the Sisters present at Hogwarts and Perenelle Flamel who offered to educate Lily in both witchcraft and alchemy. It was deemed that Lily was perfect candidate to one day become exceptional Great Mother of the order.

After extremly varied education that helped develop her mind, body and magic to exceptional levels, and after her doctoral studies at Oxford Occult, Lily was naturally contacted by Sir Archibald to be incorporated into his special task force of the Cooperation Department. She naturally performed outstanding in all her missions no matter how perillous.

All through her education and her trials as young field agent, Lily was constantly encouraged and comforted by the spiritual voicies of her ancestors she could hear in her mind, and right there beside the voice of Irina and her other mothers was the voice she grew to be fondest of – Lady Angelique of Astraté.

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It was about a month after she came back to her parents' house that Petunia finally recieved visit from Severus Snape. They had grown distant after the incident that created a break with Lily, and after her own fiasco with Lily's attempt at forming a coven. Severus disappeared right after Hogwarts and she hadn't kept in touch with Lily for years.

Now suddenly Severus was here at her door step. This reunion started with exceeding care from both sides not to bring akward memories and to make every effort to see what was left of their frienship.

Severus started making regular visits and soon he managed to make Petunia break her isolation, and so they started going out.

Quickly they both noticed they felt romantic interest for each other.

After their perfect first time, Severus' eyes became more darkened like the pits of hopelessness. He put complex wards around them and began telling her his story.

First thing he did however, was to insure Petunia he did not wait this long to use her, but that he wanted they collected more happy memories together before he told her his secrets.

After his painful early childhood, he became quite close with his father and was in fact now leader of the Spinners.

During his Hogwarts years Tobias and Severus made first steps in what would become Severus' permanent mission. With Croaker's benediction Doyle released Severus' and Petunia's test results to all Unspeakables with postdated forms and slightly changed results to incorporate their magical education up to that moment, with explanation that Croaker wanted to see practical use of Rockwood-Van Richter testing method and he considered two subjects from a community not belonging to Wizarding world a perfect oportunity. To say the Senior Director Rockwood was extatic about the news was understatement. It was the beginnig of close colaboration between Croaker's and Rockwood's teams – actually Croaker took an oportunity to keep a better eye on Rockwood and his increasing activities in supporting certain Tom Marvolo Riddle in the ascetion to become Dark Lord Voldemort.

Naturally while at Hogwarts every occasion was good for Severus to express his pure-blood supremancy beliefs and when that final incident with Lily and the Marauders occured, he used it to seal his employment contract with Lucius Malfoy.

After Hogwarts Severus start working for Rockwood as assassination expert and further expanded his potions mastery. Later he was directly under Senior Director Rockwood as research expert replacing his prematurely deceased cousin. All the while he was cooperating with Croaker into sabotaging every possible mission and using every successful one to actually create position that would bring douwnfall to pure-blood propaganda.

The ulitmate goal of Tobias and Severus was to initiate revolution that would put in motion necessary changes of the Wizarding world which was stagnating and pumping the resources of other magical communities. Instead of hoping to recover ancient glory by plagiating results of great wizards of the past, it would have been better to lead lives more in tune with magic and thus achieve what people like the Flamels and Rombaldi achieved and go even beyond.

What completely crushed Petunia was that from the start she was a piece in this plan and kept completely ignorant. The final drop that kicked the bucket fell when Severus told her that his last mission was to eliminate 'a useless muggle' – Vernon Dursley who was known to be extemely violent with prostitutes and put stop to his project to sully a nice proper witch like Petunia Evans (even though she was officially muggle-born). Petunia was uterly devastated – her life with Vernon was a lie, and she believed her friendship and love with Severus had to also be a lie, after all hadn't she also lost contact with her sister and only resently recovered warmth of the home after returning to Spinner's End. And now she descovered that all those people she called family, friends and neighbours, lived with a hidden agenda.

She started to cry and shout at Severus, and he started to hug her tightly to give her comfort he wasn't sure she would accept. They ended being envelopped into each other like they were during their love making. Fire soared fueled by anger and passion and thirst for love and comfort and finding home again, and they both started frenetical pounding into each other while crying ther committment to each other through cries and moans like animals.

After thorpughly enjoying a well deserved bliss after a Mt. Everest of orgasms, Petunia and Severus decided he would recruit her for Rockwood and offer her chance to seek revenge after the Spinners for killing Vernon, that way Rockwood would be sure of her loyalty and when the community of Spinners would fall Wizards would take possessions of their magical resources. She would also become important agent in Rockwood's quest for Rombaldi's artifacts – given her exceptional test results.

Petunia and Severus thus became secret employees of Croaker while officially working for Rockwood. Their excellence in the field easily rivaled Lily's and their successes were largely fueled by the habit they had taken in making passionate love in order to expell stress after missions.

And there was Petunia now, waking after one of the best nights of love making she could remember – of course with Severus it was so hard to keep the count. When he came back last night he was so frustrated about something and she knew it would all be expressed in the bedroom. They were right about to go from heated fore-play to proper shagging, and she couldn't believe Severus would choose that moment to open himself about the evening's events. He told her about Voldemort's plans for James and Lily Potter.

"Do you still desire her Severus? I know you had your thing with her at Hogwarts."

At first it seemed like that question showing misplaced jealousy – both because how they were closely wrapped up right at that moment and because of the fact that her sister's life was in danger, but Snape knew his woman well. "Yes you damned succubus, you Evans sisters were top wet dream material at Hogwarts, and I still can't beleive how you can make me feel as there are nothing but hormones in my blood stream."

"Then if you are good boy Severus, we will go and have our little revenge for all those times Mistress Lily Evans and pretty-boy Potter left us bothered and ashamed of our desires – right after we make sure certain self-styled Dark Lord cease to be a nuisance." And they engaged themselves into making inventory of all the things they would do to the Potters for remainder of the night.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5: The History

Munich, 20 January 1871

This is the first entry of my new diary. My old one, as my homeland, is forever lost to me – or so I thought.

For some time I believed that all aspects of my old life were gone and that any power that could bring it back to me was out of my reach. For two years I led day-to-day existence, trying to fight emotions brought by memories and to establish a new life in this foreign land.

This land nevertheless bears many similarities to Amestris, and every now and then there would be a flash of familiar face, bringing the flood of memories, only to be replaced by sorrow and understanding that it is a different person – a stranger with the face of a friend.

When I was spat into this world by the Gate two years ago, it was clear that something was fundamentally different from my expectations. The Gate itself was not something I expected to find when we had started the ritual. After long and exhausting quest to discover the truth behind conspiracies, after finding that supposed ultimate ritual, I believed we would uncover this knowledge Al and I were looking for. Instead there was a gate – the Gate.

At that very moment, I had the feeling, the intuition, that the Gate does not hide the answer, but rather represents opening for an equally long and exhausting quest as the one Al and I just completed. Still I was ready to cross and face the challenge.

On the other side I found my old man, who unlike other doppelgangers of this world was truly himself. He apparently completed the same ritual and fell into Dante's trap like myself.

In the first weeks after my arrival it was as if I was in prison – world without alchemy, without possibility to access the Gate again. After learning that in this place, my entire knowledge that my brother and I suffered greatly to acquire, was useless, I was half-tempted to kill Hohenheim on the spot. The man left his family to pursue his dreams of alchemy and ended in this empty place. Still, such act of violence would had only contributed to deepen this feeling of emptiness and loss of purpose.

For that reason I decided to accept for the moment all information Hohenheim gave me about his experience in this world, and to work with what I got.

There is also the fact that Hoheneim was, like myself, greatly manipulated by Dante. We both made many mistakes and lost much, and to deny Hohenheim his right to pursue dreams or destiny would made me a hypocrite. A grain of hope or some wild dreams continued to exist and some strange call to adventure was echoing through my mind.

The greatest surprise came probably from finding that Hohenheim worked now as professor at Munich University, specialised in physics, chemistry and engineering. That was position of his doppelganger in this world, and the two merged after Hohenheim's arrival. Hohenheim's doppelganger happened to have a son, who was my own doppelganger, and now as I arrived the same way, I have all the knowledge my doppelganger had. I could now give Winry a run for her money when it comes to automates.

I think a lot about her. The first year was the most difficult for me. At first, Hohenheim's and my hypothesis was that we took over identities of our doppelgangers when we arrived, and that now we were physicists and engineers as this world didn't have alchemy. I guess loss of alchemy was what hurt me the worst, because Al and I sacrificed so much during our quest. We let alchemy completely take over our lives, missing on other important aspects – like a possible romantic interest.

When we started to get closer to that final ritual, I started to feel more giddy every day, not only because what we were looking for was so close, but because after completing the task I could finally open myself to Winry, as I have noticed that our best friend started to display a crush for both Al and me. I'm not certain about Al as he is younger and was always more shy, but this feeling in my stomach when Winry was around was getting more difficult to ignore, alchemy or no alchemy.

After some time I finally accepted that I would never come back to Amestris, and said my goodbyes to Al and Winry, hoping that if they shared feelings they wouldn't waste their chance for happiness waiting for me. My research in domain of mechanics and engineering was filling my life with excitement the way alchemy used to.

Hohenheim and Ed of this world had great reputation throughout Europe as absolute genii in science and engineering and had complex network of collaborators. Even though we live in a world ruled by desire to conquer of various monarchs and politicians leading various powerful nations, those people of great mind still manage to work together with the common goal of advancing society. The best example is our cooperation with British engineers Lloyd and James Steam. However never-ending skirmishes between European nations seem to herald great and bloody conflict that could not only end scientific cooperation, but also seriously endanger the very existence of life.

Already last year we had to stop our collaboration with Lemarchand from France, due to Prussian-French conflict. It sometimes almost scary how this world can be so similar to the one I came from.

This conflict is also the reason of profound changes in my life – I refer to what is in some circles known as Shambala incident – the moment we almost managed to come back home.

For sentimental reasons rather than for truly believing, Hohenheim became member of groups – usually referred to as Masonic or similar, who were trying to access one or another occult force or being in order to gain power or richness – usually both. Usually those people were led by convincing charlatans trying to swindle the sheep out of their money, but sometimes those people were deadly serious about their quest. That was the case of the conspiracy group mixing some French, Bavarian and Saxon Catholics and some groups interested in the occult, who somehow managed to get their hands on obscure texts belonging to Vatican about opening a portal to mythic land of incredible richness and where source of great power could be found – called Shambala. Their goal was to gain this power and defeat Prussian forces.

When we set our eyes on the texts, Hohenheim and I instantly knew these were authentic things and not some joke people usually wasted their time about. All our beliefs about alchemy not existing in this world suddenly came to collapse. We just couldn't help it, we had to offer our help, secretly hoping to use this work and get back home. It was surprising, but it worked. We managed to open the portal leading right to the place Al and Winry were waiting for me – the very moment two years ago when I crossed the Gate. Unfortunately it became clear that ambition of conspirators to gain power was putting in danger equilibrium between the worlds and we had to counter their efforts and close the portal. As the things go in such situations, it got even more complicated up to the point where future attempts to repeat the process were seriously put in question (we sure as hell won't be doing something so stupid – although with my history of attempting human transfiguration, creation of philosopher stone and such, I shouldn't say never). At that very moment Prussian forces breached security and stormed the castle.

That led to our present situation. After explaining ourselves to a gentleman wearing cylinder and black coat with high collar, presenting himself as Generalpolizeidirektor and coincidentally also chief of Geheimpolizei – Imperial Secret Police, we were led in front of the new Emperor Wilhelm I himself. Apparently the conspirators we believed to be several cards short of complete mental deck, were actually representing serious threat to national security.

The Emperor expressed his gratitude, and complimented us on our modesty when we said we were simply at the right place at the right time. The Emperor also expressed desire to have an important and private conversation, and we were offered the chance to ride the Imperial train from Paris to Munich. The Emperor would make appearance there to thank Bavarians for their support during the conflict and to open festivities to celebrate the Unification.

During our trip the Emperor disclosed one of the best guarded secrets in the Empire. We suspected it after the events of the Shambala incident, but nevertheless, it was quite surprising to learn the true extent of it: apparently all the things about magic and the occult, all the things that general public considers as ridiculous mumbo-jumbo are completely true and more diverse than anyone could suspect.

Majority of supernatural communities live in secrecy and isolation. It was only the events during the Great plague epidemics that brought these communities briefly into the light. From the most ancient times magical humans believed to be much more resistant than those without magical gift. This became proved wrong during the Great plague. When in the 14th century the Black Death wiped out about 50% of population of Europe, Asia and Africa in just couple of years, magical communities of those continents were largely unconcerned and showed almost no reaction toward suffering of non-magical population. However, some people at key positions in the magical world saved lives of some highly important people of the non-magical world – belonging to various noble families of Europe. That proved to be of primordial importance for the survival of magical communities later on.

As the saying goes "What comes around, really comes around", by the 15th century ordinary humans developed immunity toward the disease and the pandemics receded. For reasons still unknown, the microbe mutated and gained ability to by-pass magical defences. What happened then is best described as the Great Catastrophe – the term actually employed in magical communities to describe the event. The disease was not as swift as with ordinary humans, but it was more persistent. At the beginning of the 16th century the disease was still killing, and by that time 80% of magical population perished – it was clear they were on the road to extinction.

A group of magical communities scattered through Europe and Asia, calling themselves Wizards and Witches, did what was previously unthinkable to them – they asked "muggles" for help. It was their last resort. Wizards had noticed that muggles had developed immunity toward the plague, but were unable to extract or replicate by magic the principle that was responsible for that immunity. Their inability to solve the problem of their impending doom led them to swallow their pride and ask for help.

Krabat, the Elder of Rhineland Wizards, took upon himself and went to ask an audience with the Margrave of Brandenburg who was in his debt, as Krabat in his youth helped save Hohenzollern patriarch of that time from the Black Death. The Margrave had a reputation of well connected man in cultured circles and Krabat thought this man could help him find cure for the disease. The nobleman understood quickly the difficulty of the situation, after all Krabat's community was able to subdue the Black Death using their magic, so what power could help them now and what in the disease caused it to be so lethal to wizards?

Krabat was directed toward a group of people calling themselves Order of Rosae Crucis. In the dealings Hohenzollern had with the Order, he could not notice anything magical about them. Wizards who openly interact with muggles tend to flaunt their magic in the face of those who were without it. The Order on the contrary displayed only their great knowledge and culture. The Margrave was surprised that his contact with the Order, a man named Johannes Faust, was in fact magical – as he was identified as such by Krabat himself.

Apparently, Rosicrucians were mixture of people of various origins, both magical and not. In majority of cases they were cast-outs or hermits. Their principal goal was keeping the knowledge, and promoting scientific and social advances from the shadows. On several occasions in history, great civilisations possessing great scientific knowledge and cultural refinement crumbled, and all of it was lost. The Order was formed so that no knowledge would ever be lost again like the loss created by disappearance of Atlantis. Through history, the Order had many names and forms, often using hierarchy and being confused with other Masonic structures. The mission of the Order in the middle ages and the renaissance was fighting nefarious effects Christianity had on European culture – the effects that threatened to spread if one is to judge by conquering aspirations of Spanish and Portuguese. The Order condemned the main-stream Catholic dogma, as taking the noblest ideals and perverting them in the worst possible way in order to turn people into a flock of sheep. The Order also wanted to keep and promote ideas inherited from the Greeks and the Romans, and were directly responsible for initiating the renaissance. Also the Order was at the basis of seemingly opposing movements like the reformation and the counter-reformation. Wilhelm I, a member of the Order himself, disclosed that Jean Calvin, Michel of Notre-Dame and Inigo of Loyola were all members of the same Parisian loge.

Wizard culture was greatly threatened by the plague. Many families were completely wiped or leaving few members – often young children. Connections with other magical communities and non-human magical species were broken.

The magicals also suffered from the turmoil reigning in Europe of the 13th-16th century. There were organised exterminations of the supernatural like witch-huntings, and societies that fought to keep threat of demonic vampires at bay were actually more successful in exterminating some noble clans of true vampires in France and Italy. Exposed magicals, if not being treated like devil spawn and killed on the spot, often ended being involved in different wars, like Jeanne d'Arc against the English, and the secret order of Dragon-knights against the Turks and the Golden horde – which led to them getting killed just the same (having magical gift does not mean you can't be killed by someone or something without magic).

Important quantities of knowledge were being lost. The Order was happy to act. They would use what they were faithfully guarding in order find cure and help promote cooperation that could help advance humanity toward the way it should be.

Faust called in the best people he knew for the task, Paracelsus and Michel of Notre-Dame. They were extraordinary physicians, possessing both medical knowledge and the knowledge of what this world at that time called alchemy – what today became chemistry. They were non-magical humans, but had ability to think outside the box and combine scientific information in the most incredible ways, and that was magic of its own.

Krabat brought the three men to his community. Others were firstly reluctant to accept the help, but to all was clear that time was for desperate measures, and if what Krabat heard of the Order was true that might not be that desperate. The Order members proved to be worthy of their reputation and with the input from local healers were able to combine information and pick correct direction how to find cure.

Later the modern Magical Ministries were formed, and even though wizards still live in secrecy the don't live in isolation or contempt of muggles which was provoked by the way religious fanatics of different religions treated the supernatural.

However, lately Imperial Secret Services heard of the stirring among magical communities and it seemed that wizards were contaminated by the desire to conquer – the desire that was spreading through European nations once again and heralded future great conflicts. On several occasions the Ministries usurped their authority over other close magical communities.

Hohenheim and I were given the offer we can't refuse. We will be given carte blanche to travel and conduct scientific and magical research, and make any contacts with any scientific or magical expert we deem necessary regardless of their nationality or species – on the counterpart during our journeys we will also research for possible political instabilities coming from the magical world.

So we begin the voyage that, we hope, will bring us home. Still, I find myself in a similar position to the one I was in when started my mission for the State Military. I have unpleasant feeling I'm about to once again become pawn in deep political manipulations.

Also not to forget to mention, today is my 17th birthday. Apparently 16 and 17 are important ages among some magical communities.

Basel, 25 February 1871

The first month of our quest was interesting to say the least. We are in the phase of our research when we need to create classification for the sources of information. The field we are starting to research is a mixture of true science and magic, myths, Masonic symbolism, ridiculous beliefs and charlatanism.

We were warned by the Emperor not to follow the trail left by Krabat right at the beginning. The region that was under rule of the Holy Empire and was now Germany, was notorious for scattered communities governed by dark (usually evil and with perverted sense of humour) wizards and crones. Krabat himself was apprentice to such dark wizard. Therefore we decide to follow the lead of Paracelsus and Faust (he was an outcast of magical community and therefore safe).

We are now in Basel, Paracelsus studied here and we might get better knowledge of how to start our research. Knowledge we collect might help us also gain credentials to safely access magical communities.

We have uncovered great source of information, not only about non-magical science but of magical science and history as well.

Great number of entries form Paracelsus' diary of that time mention a man named Potter, Krabat's acquaintance – yeah, that was a surprise, who would have the old hermit had any contacts further of Dusseldorf – after all he did know Margrave of Brandenburg.

Basel, 10 April 1871

Had devoured the notes of Paracelsus and Potter.

Surprisingly for an old geezer who was well over 150, Krabat held great respect for this Potter and his entire family. Paracelsus mentions that it was apparently the Potter patriarch who saved Krabat from his old master and opened doors to all sorts of new magic to the young warlock.

Before coming to Brandenburg, Krabat was trying to enlist the help of the Potter family. Strangely the Potters declined – indeed Paracelsus thought it was quite strange, after all they seemed to be one of those "champions of light".

The initial assessment of Paracelsus was actually wrong. The Potters behaved like they were unconcerned by the Great plague and the great number of magicals dying. It seemed this family was immune to the catastrophe.

When Krabat made a call again for the man after he gathered his team, the man came right away. Potter explained that he did indeed know the cure – or actually a path to find the cure, but this path needed the presence of non-magicals.

What's more, all participants needed to be completely trusting of each other, and if Krabat was not ready to go ask muggles for help, Potter could not help him as it would be just useless to impose asking muggles for help – Krabat needed to understand himself the value of muggles in this task.

Potter explained that someone willingly contaminated magic. The magic, unlike what wizards believe, is neither a tool or a simple force, nor is it without intelligence and consciousness. The person responsible for the Great plague made it so magic started to despise wizards and some magical species. They also combined several microbes and engineered them to have ability to break through all possible magical defences employed by its intended targets.

Potter knew of the power that could save them, but that power was useless if they had no respect and understanding they had to charm magic again to protect them like before.

Krabat understood why his pleas were unanswered before. Even in his advanced age he was about to learn more about magic from this family he respected so much.

Potter explained they would perform a ritual to unleash the power needed to break the enchantments on magic. They would need Paracelsus and Notre-Dame to work on the samples and discover how microbes attacked the host – Potter gave them access to a laboratory that was centuries in advance to anything known to man and had number of scientific compendiums that explained how human body functioned. Potter explained he knew a lot about the stuff, but that he also needed help of true scientists to make the needed advances in order to make the cure.

The ritual Potter proposed left Krabat and Faust totally stunned – he would break a taboo of wizard society and mix magic of different families. What's more they would be making invocation of the most obscure and dangerous forces known to wizards and would use artefacts only heard of in old-women's tales. How Potter knew these artefacts were detained by particular individuals was a complete mystery to everyone.

Potter called in another man – he trusted him with his life – Ezekiel Gaunt. Gaunt and Krabat didn't like each other very much, but were so much alike and both equally showing traces of dark past that Paracelsus couldn't stop making jokes whenever they were about to be at each other's throats. They didn't like each other, but they respected each other, for they too could see those traces on the other and understood the hardships that were behind those scars.

Potter took out from his shrunken bag an invisibility cloak. Gaunt took from his finger his family ring. Krabat took out from his sleeve a wand – it was such a long time since he used it, he had other wands (he crafted himself) and could also perform all magic he ever needed without any kind of artefact.

Potter explained that for things to work three of them would use their family magic and invoke the power of three objects. They would then willingly give that power to Faust. The three objects were known to wizards as the Deathly Hallows. It was incredibly Potter knew who possessed them and even more he knew how to combine them and unleash their power to turn Faust into Master of Death. The key of successful operation was willingness of wizards to surrender their magic, give it its freedom and not treat it as their slave.

Potter drew a complex runic circle (I wonder how similar it was to Amestrian circles).

They gave their power to Faust who used directions from Paracelsus and Notre-Dame to make necessary manipulations on homunculus (!!!) representing general human image.

When the ritual was finished, the wave of power left Faust and a ghostly image of a woman floated above alchemy circle and she spoke:

"I know it is you Laurentius Potter responsible of breaking my enchantments. If it was meant to be I am glad it was you. The Potters are my favourite lovers and magic likes them a lot as well. But make no mistake, I'll make sure this is the last time the Potter family puts stop to my plans. You should have let the sheep perish. Their betrayal hurts me much.

Enjoy the taste of the first step of my revenge – I bestow this power you used against me forever on your family. Every generation's first born Potter son will be Master of Death until the End of Times. You will be forced to hide yourselves and your children will never carelessly play lest you face fear and prejudice of your peers. I know the Potters could never be corrupted by power, but power also attracts fear and jealousy of others.

I have just stripped your friends of their family magic, see how thankful they will be you saved their lives and forced them to live as near squibs. I give that magic to you, enjoy their hatred and desire to exterminate your family. I can see the dark in their hearts.

The Dark is now part of you." and the spectre vanished.

We will seek other sources about the Potters.

Prague, 4 April 1872

Our research on combining this worlds runes with Amestrian alchemy circles is advancing in great steps. We also managed to awaken our dormant powers. We can perform both Amestrian alchemy and runic magic. It also seems we have some affinity for what is considered usual wizard magic here.

Large scale magic (alchemy), like one performed by Scar is unheard on this world – at least among wizards, which of course isn't saying much as their culture was greatly crippled.

Our best shot is looking for works of magical historians.

We are now following the road travelled by many of those on spiritual journey – it seems the East guards some interesting secrets. In the last century many explorers of the occult travelled the Balkans, the Near East or the Caucasia, going to Tibet, India and the Far East.

Certain parts of the world seem to be centres for the occult. I don't like making distinction between the dark and the light (I can't believe one could cripple their strength by such consideration), but such distinction have life-saving usefulness in practice, as light magic is not likely to kill you.

Prague, 6 May 1872

I really can't believe after all I went through as a State Alchemist of Amestris and my quest on Earth that the old geezer still managed to trap us.

Apparently the Jews use spiritual symbolism very close to the one employed by Ishbals and therefore close to Amestrian alchemy.

That golem was a nasty piece of work. It was creepy how similar to homunculi they are.

There might be earlier inter-dimensional travellers to this world.

We will study works of Judah of Loew and later go to Palestine and study the sources left by Isaak Luria.

Belgrade, 15 June 1872

The place is a mixture of cultures and communities.

We became acquainted with vampire politics. It's incredible how far you can get with willing sharing of blood, especially with Strigoi.

The Danube is the separating line between the territory occupied by Vrlok and Strigoi covering entire Balkans and governed by a powerful vampire called "The Count", and the territory of the Ordoghaz alliance that covers Austro-Hungarian Empire. Italy is the territory of the surviving noble clans, while remaining Europe is largely infested by the demonics and is therefore avoided by true vampires as they prefer not to cross path with some fanatical hunters.

Elder of the Belgrade community suggested we go to Italy after our journey to the Holy Land. We could learn the great deal as vampires there are highly civilised, using their extended lifespan to produce refined and scientifically advanced society hidden from mortals. It is her thanks for our help in the affair concerning demonic vampire called Sava Savanovich. His case is peculiar one – his corpse was contaminated by a rouge hell-butterfly from Shinigami world.

Venice, 20 January 1873

I turned 19 today.

We came early to prepare for the Carnival. For Europeans of Latin heritage it is equivalent of the Halloween for the Western and Northern Europeans.

Our travels up till now unveiled great importance of the Potter family on the evolution of magic of this world (and it seems other dimensions) and their conflict with mysterious group of women. These women always claimed to be protectors of magic and humans – and that humans got hurt only if they served gods-parasites of their followers' devotion or if they betrayed 'her'.

They claimed the Potters should better keep the guard against invasion and spiritual menaces of creatures coming from other planets than to mess up 'her' plans

Venice, 25 January 1873

Entered in contacts with some members of a vampire clan Volturi. They are quite fascinating compared to other European families and vampiric species.

Apparently we are getting a reputation with all adventures we had on our quest. Fortunately it seems we are being respected in this community and are seen as open minded individuals and not prejudiced hunters that are currently roaming across Europe.

Volturi are holders of great supernatural knowledge.

Venice, 12 February 1873

Had a hot Carnival night with a girl of Volturi clan. She kept her mask on and I'm completely in the dark concerning her identity. However, I couldn't be wrong concerning her being a Volturi. During such festivities Italian vampires actually try to enhance the skin effect they try to hide otherwise. Also the nibbling was a giveaway.

Volturi who are native of Venice laugh and say I should cherish the memory of the moment. Our standing with the clan got higher since the event.

The girl also did something strange. She disclosed information about an important source of magical knowledge that is usually avoided. This place is palazzo on Canal Grande.

London, 20 March 1873

Exploring of palazzo was a near catastrophe, and it was way beyond any such slight fiasco Al and I had with Dante and homunculi. Yeah, I'm almost laughing thinking how diverse dangers of magic and supernatural on this can be compared to Amestris.

I guess the events of the Great plague and subsequent loss of knowledge made false impression that this world is safer than Amestris and Ishbal concerning dangers of the occult.

There was actually a very serious reason why the palazzo was being avoided, I should say like a plague, by all magicals and non-magicals alike. It was normally guarded against entrance of unsuspecting fools – like Hohenheim and myself, but for some reason that competent Authorities among Volturi clan will hurry up to discover, it was not the case that night.

Luckily we only slightly stirred the forces sleeping in that place, which belonged to three women being called Mater Suspiriorum, Mater Tenebrarum and Mater Lachrimarum, who are apparently three immensely powerful crones and were not seen in Italy since the fall of the Roman Empire.

Subsequent interrogation from the Volturi made clear that the girl was imposter or under powerful control. We are unable to give more information that could lead to her identity. Guarding the knowledge from falling into wrong hands or from hurting the innocent is the reason of the Volturi presence in Venice.

We are now in London as we were obliged to flee Venice (we are for the moment being personae non gratae with the Volturi).

London, 25 March 1873

After our close survival we will take sabbatical moment. We need to put our notes in order and decide upon directions to take. We will also take the moment to concentrate on our engineering research.

We have once again a chance to work with the Steams (we might finally make some advance on the rocket engine) and also thanks to the Merchants we are again in contact with their cousins the Lemarchands – the genii of computing mechanisms (we are working on incorporating electricity or it might be interesting to use magic to power their mechanisms).

We are following ideas of Jules Vern (the man is absolute genius and prophet concerning fiction and technology) – we try to organise space travelling expeditions (to the Moon first and later through the Solar system).

Vienna, 2 May 1875

Needed to come to a place under jurisdiction of Geheimpolizei in order to make our report, but which was far away from Berlin and the Emperor. Coincidentally, we are also travelling with our friend Gustav Lemarchand to Istanbul. His great-uncle, a black sheep of the family, installed himself there during Napoleonic era, and after passing away at blissful age of 102 left him all his properties including a house there.

Gustav has no experience concerning dangers that might come upon him during such journey and we proposed to accompany him.

Met interesting young man, Jonathan Harker, travelling to Transylvania. He is apparently to meet the ruler of Strigoi and Vrloks. What could push the Count to move to London. That is quite unusual for vampires of his species. There is nothing for him there but foreign land infested with demonics and vampire hunters.

Harker doesn't show to posses knowledge of the supernatural. Strange for someone who is apparently in the Count's service. However, we have too much on our agenda already and I will not mix myself in this matter.

Istanbul, 30 June 1875

Took me quite some time to recover from my ordeal. Gustav and Hohenheim are dead.

Apparently there are much worse and more perverted bitches than Dante.

Lemarchand Mansion in Istanbul was a luxurious palace. God only knows the true extent of richness of this man or his genius.

The household is incredible. Gustav's great-uncle apparently wanted to copy the Sultan, and created a small harem. A supernatural harem – a succubus, a veela, a yuki-ona, a vampire and some sort of were-jaguar of Brazil. That explains the lack of other inheritors (meaning possible children). The man must have been regularly drained long before these girls would actually accept to mate a human and bear his children. It is possible he bought these girls from the Sultan himself as the Ottoman Empire has been on steady decline for some time.

The man was also a complete masochist, the likes of which this world will probably not see in a long time.

Correction, after my transformation that might not be the case.

As I said, the man was absolute genius concerning mechanics and all aspects of engineering. After seeing his workshop we immediately new our project of space travel will achieve enormous progress, but his works will need to be thoroughly analysed. There were all sorts of mechanisms, some able of instant transportation to selected area.

And in the middle of all the chaos in the man's workshop there was the Box. An innocent looking puzzle, looking like child's music-box.

I have opened it. Darkness sprang from it and devoured us. We were first greeted by four people horribly mutilated. They offered to lead us on some sort of enlightenment explorations in a dimension of absolute pleasure.

These four were however subdued by a newcomer, a woman. The four were extremely furious. The woman greeted me, and I recognised her as my one night stand from Venice.

I don't know for what reason, but I was unable to refuse her proposition and accepted her pleasures. And pleasures I received. She drained me herself. And later teamed herself with the girls of harem – they were absolutely famished – it was quite some time the old man was dead.

When I came a bit to myself I saw bodies of Gustav and Hohenhiem at my feet. They died in the most painful way possible. The woman said they were unable to withstand the transformation. Suddenly I was beside a gigantic replica of the Box. It was called the Leviathan – an ultimate calculating mechanism of sorts and a way to transform humans into a next stage of spiritual evolution – or that is what the woman said. She said the four, her servants (the four not pleased to be referred as such) were the Cenobites.

I quickly became imprisoned inside the Box, and it tried to transform me in the similar way it transformed others.

However, alchemy Al and I performed made so we reacted differently when coupled with mechanical enhancements. Also the transformation was supposed to brain-wash me and give me new identity. Like was apparently the case with the four: Pinhead, Female, Butterball, and Chatterer – they have lost their previous memories.

Something in myself triggered a new level of the Box. I was seeing images of the past.

..........................................................................................................................................

Outskirts of Paris, 1728

A frightened little girl was sitting chained in the dungeons of an isolated turret. She was shivering and emitting sobs form time to time. Her tears were running short and her cries were getting quieter. Her despair rose with the knowledge no one could save her. She was abducted in the middle of the night from her family's property and they were maybe killed by the criminals.

She was perhaps six or eight. It was the perfect age for what needed to be done. She also had particular little gifts that made her potentially incredibly useful if the girl was compatible. She was indeed.

An elegantly dressed woman entered the dungeons.

The lady was pretty and the girl got her hopes up, surely someone that pretty could not be a mean person.

"Hello darling, you are a very brave little girl." the woman said in a voice that gave hopes to the chained child.

The woman snapped her fingers and the chains disappeared.

"Now isn't it much better now. If you are good little girl and won't try stupid things I will make you stay here more pleasant." The girl nodded.

"Excellent! Now let me introduce myself – my friends call me Dora, and I would very much like to be your friend."

The girl listened standing still.

"If you are my friend, what I need to do will be without pain.

You see, a friend of mine, Rombaldi, taught me how to use little girls to hide myself from my enemies. You don't need to be afraid honey, I'm way gentler than my mean friend Francis who took you away – he can be quite a brute with his boys and girls.

There is way for us to be part of same personality and if you are my friend I can make it so that I don't crush your identity and let you live your life the way you like.

Francis, here, uses both boys and girls, but I prefer girls. You may not know the meaning, but girls are genetic masters of human species – it's crippled chromosome and some chemicals produced by mothers that turn boys into boys, but you're girl by yourself right from the start. I learnt all that from my friend Rombaldi.

If the circumstances were less serious, I could let you go if you are not willing, after erasing your memory of course.

Unfortunately, I'm playing with big boys and they hold no punches. You see, there are big meanies like Ba'al who will be ruthless with any little girl to get information about me. There are also people way too clever for they own good who could get in my way, like the Potters – they sure are big boys, just like their friends the Longbottoms, but I digress here.

What I need you to understand darling, is that I can't afford to let you go alive and I would also need to rip your soul to pieces – I have this little box for that. So, if you want to live there is only one option for you, and trust me you will be able to live your life fully to your destiny.

The girl nodded fearfully that she accepted.

"Excellent! I knew you would understand well my point! Such a smart child you are.

Now please meet my old friend here, your mama may know her."

The woman briefly transformed into a very old woman and then returned to her youthful aspect.

"That was my friend Angelique."

"My mama indeed knows her, she calls her 'old hag'."

The woman laughed. "That she may be, but once she too was a little girl like you. Now it's time for her to go onto the destiny that is her own and she can't be part of me anymore. At least not the part that matters – I will always keep her memories."

"Are you ready darling?"

The girl nodded.

The spectre of the old woman rose and disappeared from Dora.

Dora then picked the girl's face gently and locked her eyes with her. With point of her fingers she massaged particular points on the girl's neck that would stimulate nervous conducts and she chanted:

"My mind to your mind… My thoughts to your thoughts…"

The woman's body turn to wind that whirled shortly around the girl, and then there was silence.

"Now it's time we go back to our home" the girl spoke.

Her name was Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson.

Couvent des Capucines, 1764

She was sitting on a large tombstone contemplating the night. Her host had lived a very full and public life. The spot-light of that existence was starting impend on her agenda. She noticed similar problems when she was Angelique, but luckily the woman was not as public as Jeanne. With Jeanne she needed to fake her death. Thank Pazuzu for dysentery.

She was quite fond of the little fellow – if one would dare use such term for the king of wind demons, even though its physical manifestation was a locust. With it she learned all about powers of Cthulhu, like possessing humans and such. With its help she wrote one of her pseudo names in the Necronomicon in order to pretend to be one of the Fallen. Pity possessions were not safe anymore, but luckily she found Rombaldi.

With public death and burial comes the need to force yourself from the tomb, which might let some people to confuse you with vampires. Like a very young and inexperienced Slayer.

The girl was apparently member of the Couvent and the filthy Watchers must have an outpost close-by if they located her so quickly.

She would gladly pick the girl as new host, but she was too old for the transfer.

It was unfortunate, but she needed to use the big means. With the wave of magic she immobilised the girl in the middle of an air-kick (of course she could use her physical strength to simply snap the girl's neck), and sent a mind probe to scan the surroundings. She quickly located the Watcher keeping the guard – what despicable individual, the girl would have died and he wouldn't lift a finger except to put a note of her death in his diary.

She held both still in the air. She took a box from the depths of her coat. After short manipulation the Darkness sprang and they were isolated in the pocket dimension – no deity could detect what was happening here.

"What do you have for here Princess?" a deep voice came from the Dark, then a pale face of a man came into the view. His skull was horribly mutilated with long nails creating a grid on his head.

"Marvellous! A Watcher! What arrogant bastards they are. I look forward to showing this stuck-up fag what pleasures we have."

"I see the girl is a different matter Princess, she holds in herself traces of your darling pet. I will be most gentle with that part of her soul."

With that he disappeared taking with him his two victims, who though rendered unable to speak clearly showed in their eyes level of hysteria they were feeling.

And so, her she was enjoying the night and contemplating her next move.

"Well Jeanne, I can't let you go just yet. You know, it's all your fault – you're such an ambitious girl. And I adore you."

"We will need to transform a bit. I may use you for a longer time than it's possible for a human body to withstand."

"It's time for us to go to the New World. I have to prepare final steps for my Potter project."

New Orleans, 1851

The girl was an absolute treasure. Whoever was her maker must had been out of his mind to perform such sacrilege, but of course this is the New World and people go around breaking ancient rules all the time.

She was a demonic vampire – an Egyptian strain if her flair was right. They were almost as pure as the true ones, they retained their soul.

She was around six when she was turned.

The magical scan showed perfect compatibility.

The girl had picked her for a snack, now it was time for her to be a predator.

New Orleans, 1852

Claudia was perfect in every way. It was time for her to put her plans in motion.

To put Claudia to her greatest use, the girl needed to be able to transform. She needs to break through enchantments chaining Claudia's existence to demonic core residing in the Egyptian queen. Claudia's body must be destroyed.

She has an idea of the perfect plot to make it happen. Mind of Lestat was like an open book.

Paris, 1853

Povre Madeleine. She should have told Louis such thing as surrogate mother was not necessary, but that would create suspicion.

Povre Louis. He puts his hands on her calcinated body and the cinders get scattered by the wind while he cries silent tears.

Venice, 1873

She aged Claudia to be about 17. She could now also go into the sunshine like the local vampires – the Volturi. With proper treatment it was possible to make her skin shine like theirs was in the sun.

Volturi are visited by some young man making magical pilgrimage and following the trail of Laurentius Potter and those who helped him vanquish the Great plague. Talking about poetic justice and cold vengeance – this would be so funny, and she knew just the right thing to do with her unsuspecting victim.

Ararat after its destruction, ancient times

Luckily she was out of the city when gods launched the attack. Unfortunately they created zone of protection around the ruins. She used that trick Prometheus taught her and hid herself wile observing Ba'al and listening his words.

"Sister Ishtar, with your foolishness you endangered us and our source of pleasures that comes from consuming devotion of our believers – you created a child capable of transmitting magic to the slaves. For that as your punishment you will lose your eternity. Your daughter will be hunted down and all her existential aspect will be destroyed."

"Men throughout the world are gaining knowledge of magic – Ishtar's spawn was not the only threat. If we are not vigilant a day will come when men would achieve all that is godlike and become like us, and we would be left without such delectable food."

Outskirts of Thar desert, about 1000 years after destruction of Ararat

She had never cried so much in her existence. Not even when Ba'al banished her mother and killed her fathers.

She tasted betrayal for the first time. Which was probably sign of great luck if she was able to go that long without being betrayed – after all humans do that to each other all the time.

That tribe was among descendants of those she taught magic long time ago. And now those three shamans of the tribe betrayed her – even though many times she had confirmed by words and actions she would protect them against all demonic threat. Those people were greedy and wanted more power and security, and they spat on every gift she gave them.

They used the knowledge she gave them and bound her darling Snuffles – a nine-tail wolf-demon to that innocent girl, just to create a weapon they could control and use at their every whim.

Gaul, about 3000 BC

Perfidy of human species apparently knows no boundaries. Although after all her dealings with them, she really shouldn't be surprised.

A visitor from another world came to preach his ways to inhabitants of the Ever-green valley. He calls himself Ma'el of Thaelon. Those who follow him treat their magic as a lifeless tool, instead of a living force flowing through them with a mind of its own.

This abomination is something beyond what she could imagine from those who were gifted such a precious gift.

Arrogant followers of Ma'el think they are better and wiser than those who treat magic with respect – they call themselves wizards.

Wizards combined their magic and the newly acquired knowledge to unleash the attack against Goblin and Fay settlements of the valley, saying only the chosen race of wizards should live in the Ever-green valley.


	6. Chapter 6

A.N. May anyone be interested in becoming my Beta? I would really like to eliminate all possible errors in spelling and grammar. My thanks to David305 and Dark Dragen for directing my attention on the aspects that need to be mended.

Also, if you have some remarks concerning characters or the plot, please feel free to make them known – it is my goal, after all, to make this story the best it can be.

Chapter 6: Grey Eminence

Edward's transformation was long and painful. More painful than is the case of usual Cenobite transformation – there is after all only so much that a flesh can take before going numb. For that reason Leviathan's usual creations are simple mutilations with some added mechanism.

However, something about Edward Elric offered a whole spectrum of never before seen possibilities – he would become Leviathan's masterpiece, and Pandora's chief servant. Edward's flesh had such incredible resistance.

Leviathan is sort of super-computer, stored inside and having the form of Pandora's box. It is a being of cold intelligence.

In recent history, adventurers who sought forbidden pleasures called the box Lament or Lemarchand configuration – due to mistaken belief that it was a Lemarchand who crafted it. The truth is it was Prometheus who created it as a toy for little Pandora. Later the box was transformed by both Prometheus and Pandora. It is however true that the box was upgraded to its last version by Prometheus posing as a worker in one of Lemarchands' workshops – hence the mistake.

Both Prometheus and Pandora had become renegades after Gods destroyed Ararat in a cataclysmic event.

Pandora, with her incredible luck that manifested itself many times later on, was outside the city when Gods unleashed their wrath upon innocent population. Prometheus was not of that chance and had spent considerable time imprisoned in dimensional chasm left by Ba'al to protect any possible leftover among ruins. Fortunately Pandora was able to overcome Ba'al's security system – a cherub, and save Prometheus.

After their reunion they organised resistance against those Gods who wanted to remain parasites of the faith of their followers. Patiently they created a network of unsuspecting agents through various communities, often hiding resorting to possession of their victims or posing as different magical beings – Demons, Elves, magical humans, etc. or even as Gods.

Humans in their stupidity betrayed Pandora many times, she who gave many incredible gifts and fought to allow their evolution from simply being spiritual or physical food for Gods and other powerful beings.

Nevertheless, on many occasions Prometheus and Pandora met human beings who greatly surprised them in a good way – helping them, keeping them on the right path, opening their eyes to new possibilities. Such was the case of a genius Seer and alchemist Rombaldi and his grand-daughter Lucy Lovegood who brought many important improvements to the box. Such was the case of the Potters – the intimate enemies: Pandora's greatest lovers and adversaries.

In a similar way, Edward Elric – the dimensional traveller, was to become important piece in a very deadly game. Game with unclear number of sides was masterfully played by all participants who were skilful enough to survive it. Moves played often by motives completely blurred to human understanding, moves often described as incredible evil.

Edward and Alfonse Elric performed all sorts of alchemy transformations that unknowingly to them affected their bodies. Of course the more important ones, such as attaching Al's soul to an armour and Ed's loss of arm and leg, could not pass without being noticed. During their quest Elric brothers had entered completely uncharted waters of alchemy, unseen even by Hohenheim.

This made Edward's flesh able to integrate any mechanism added by Leviathan without much strain to the flesh itself. Therefore Leviathan unleashed all its cold fantasy and creativity on the victim. Edward's body was completely disintegrated and his flesh, cell by cell, grafted onto a new skeleton. His body was full of nano-machines. They not only ran through his circulatory system, but contaminated each individual cell grafting themselves onto membrane network inside or on ribosomes and similar structures of the cell.

The box is a hellish gateway among infinity of worlds – an improved version of the Gate of Destiny through which Edward arrived. Leviathan's increasing intelligence was making it largely independent of initial programming done by Prometheus and Pandora. It was starting to mix its own agenda with the plans Pandora made.

Officially Edward was to become one of many servants that travelled dimensions, seekers of the outer regions. Unofficially Leviathan gave Edward the power to be Pandora's equal and be a wild card that would bring uncontrolled input to improve Pandora's evolution. For, if one does not evolve, the one stagnates and dies, and no true God ever finishes its creation.

The first thing Edward noticed after transformation was that his mind was changed to be able to integrate all knowledge Leviathan spewed on him, still he was his own person and not like those Cenobite fanatics mindless servant.

The second thing was his body. Parts of his skin that were still visible were unnaturally pale, his yellow eyes became silver and his hair white. His automats were replaced by a bio-suit, comfortable like natural extension of his body.

And of course let's not forget a direct neural interface with Leviathan itself, interface with a mind of its own and which called itself Dumaine. Dumaine's function was to adapt information because even with infinitely superior mind to humans, Edward's intelligence was still one of unicellular organism compared to Leviathan's.

At present Edward was contemplating the effects of transformation and planning his mission – collecting information about the Potter family.

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Godric's Hollow was a lovely place. In many aspects it reminded him of his home town in Amestris. There was a warmth and openness characteristic for small towns which had chance to live good times for long. Something for which the Potters were greatly responsible, according to the locals.

He still wondered why would Leviathan send him here. True, this property was of great sentimental value for the family, but they spent majority of their time in London.

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Dumaine was worried and even slightly afraid, but it could understand the amplitude of hysterical reaction coming from Edward – after all it had access to all Edward's memories.

Their curiosity was peaked while passing the cemetery. They could sense incredible levels of sorrow and anger, usually connected to extremely tragic deaths.

The eye of the tornado of all those oppressing emotions was a tomb of a young woman, she was seventeen at the time of her death. It was a statue of a crying angel, at its feet a formula expressing sadness of the family and the girl's name: Ariana Dumbledore.

The maelstrom of emotions was picking up speed and the ground and the surroundings were starting to freeze. Although it was nothing for Leviathan's main servant, Edward was reminded of the coldness and emptiness he felt in his soul at the moment his body was being modified. Suddenly a raven landed on a shoulder of the statue and cried into the night. Earth of the tomb started to move and a hand appeared. Edward quickly approached and took the hand to help whoever was trying to get out. Not that he would be worried, but from Leviathan's database he extracted that this was not a vampire but a raven revenant. He gave a strong pull and found himself face to face with Winry – her doppelganger actually.

That led to the present situation. It was one of those moments when Dumaine showed unusual friendliness and humanity, and interrupted the mental link between Ed and Leviathan. It was clear that Leviathan would be extremely unhappy that its masterpiece exhibited those disgusting emotions. Dumaine was fully submerged in philosophical contemplation examining how such cold intelligence would express unhappiness while waiting for Ed to recover.

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Dumaine discovered that Leviathan is an enormous pervert – pieces of Edward's humanity were purposely left waiting for the moment Ed would meet Winry of this world. To very pissed Ed, Dumaine relayed how much Leviathan enjoyed the orgasm of emotions it received and that it expected Dumaine to try interrupt the connection. Leviathan stored that particularly pleasant memory together with the memory of tearing the flesh of Captain Spencer.

Like Ed had already seen at the moment of her entrance in the world of the undead, Ariana was a raven revenant. Extremely strong one, which was expected given the tragedy of her life.

Dumbledores were a middle-class pureblood wizard family. They were not among powerful families that held seats on the High Wizengamot, but held long tradition of educated and strong wizards which gave opened doors to various positions in the Ministry and a place on the Low Wizengamot.

Percival and Kendra Dumbledore lived in a happy marriage. It was an arranged one, but their families knew each other well and they were childhood friends. Initial friendship had transformed into love. He worked as a legal counsellor, she was a housewife and a healer of their community. They were blessed with three lovely children: Albus, Aberforth and Ariana.

Unfortunately their happiness was not to last and dark misfortune was to hit this family. Little Ariana was seen doing accidental magic by some muggle boys who savagely attacked and raped her. She would remain traumatised for life and her magic uncontrolled. Percival went completely mad with anger and took vengeance on the boys. He was later arrested and sentenced to lifetime in Azkaban. Family had lost everything and they moved to Godric's Hollow.

Their misfortune did not end there. Ariana's sickness demanded constant care, she was often subject to violent attacks of wild magic. One such attack killed her mother creating further trauma for the girl.

The brothers gave their best to take care of Ariana, but Albus was a scholar more at ease with books and Aberforth was hot-headed boy who thought more with his heart than with his head. Also, in those days psychiatry was nonexistent both in muggle and magical world. Her closed heart was full of anger, fear, sorrow and guilt. She died by accident in a fight between her brothers and a third young man. Her soul departed feeling the shock and guilt of her brothers, but her soul could never find peace.

In the after-life there is a limo where traumatised souls get trapped and there dwell predators that enjoy consuming emotions emanating from those souls. The souls transform under the venom of predators and become raven revenants who return to life seeking vengeance, vengeance often leading to even more sorrow for the predators to eat.

The girl had great potential and could make its masterpiece even better, and so it let Edward cure catatonic girl. Later it enjoyed greatly when Edward fulfilled his dreams of love and bonded with Ariana.

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It had been several days they were watching Albus. He was greatly shocked by what Gellert had done to Aberforth's family and was wallowing in pain and guilt.

The moment had come to put Albus on the right track that would lead to desired transformations in the wizarding world; that would put all pieces in the right place for Pandora's next move.

The adversary was getting stronger by the day. Nevertheless, careful movements were necessary in order to achieve victory without showing yourself to the enemy.

Albus needs a companion, a familiar that is symbol of light and hope; Albus the scholar would become Albus the leader of light followed by wizard masses. They had just the right idea that goes nicely with Ariana's powers – after all she was connected to a bird totem. Thanks to Edward curing her, she could connect to any other animal totem she wants. That way she would become not only some member of particular species but its spiritual representation containing the best qualities. Also she would use her still active bond to her brother to simulate connection with a familiar. Tomorrow, Albus will wake up bonded to a phoenix.

That little mission with Corto Maltese showed that Rasputin is climbing in the commanding chain – he had become one of John Milton's top agents and the main pillar to Gellert's power.

Edward will have to make a little trip to East Bromwich and put an end to Rasputin's little project. It also wouldn't do to let the Bureau capture a member of the family. Hopefully he would also manage to feed members of the Thule Society to the box – Pinhead would enjoy all those gentlemen eager for new supernatural experiences.

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He considers himself male as that is how he is most comfortable, although when necessary and to satisfy certain of his pleasures he could become female. Though lately he had taken the liking in being referred to as 'Mr. John Milton', that is not his real name – he actually has none. He never wanted to follow the example of 'the Fallen' and have a name, let alone have it inscribed in Necronomicon. Though some spirits find it's a sign of prestige, name can leave you vulnerable – as that fool Azazel experienced.

Among those who had almost grasped his true nature he is viewed as spiritual entity possessing bodies of helpless victims. It is true that like those spirits who call themselves 'the Fallen', he often used touch to propagate his contamination among mortals, however he is not limited by the time he can spend out of the body either as spectral form or psycho projection. He can also create his own body from surrounding matter.

Not much can harm Mr. Milton – some form of magic (for that reason he often enjoyed wiping out various magic users), and as he sometimes feeds on spiritual devotion he can be harmed by display of true spiritual strength. However, odds of killing him are astronomically low and even that is useless as he is a spiritual being and can transcend the realms and access again this world. If there existed the means that could permanently harm him, he didn't know, and that was both comforting and worrisome.

During Neolithic, in the land that is referred as Canaan, there used to live a Phoenician tribe who worshiped Mr. Milton as their deity – often referring to him as 'Lord'. Being artful as he is, Mr. Milton gained popularity and prestige and they started to call him father creator, father of other gods, spreading his influence among several tribes.

However, this spirit has complex hunger that cannot be simply quenched; he needs his little games with mortals and likes to play both divine and enemy spirits in order to consume greater spiritual devotion of his followers. His pleasures were greatly satisfied when in the land of Canaan came gullible little tribe of Semitic warring nomads calling themselves the Hebrews – in the everlasting quest for the promised land they would call their own. The Elders of the nomads much too quickly adopted Mr. Milton as their deity, and being lured by the promises of land and fertility, the Hebrews started the conquest of Canaan.

The Hebrew tribe is example of what we call 'go straight for the top of spiritual hierarchy'. It certainly seems as intelligent policy – if the right path in life is to worship some entity, it's the best to worship 'the top dog'. However, people just cannot see how vast and complex the spiritual hierarchy can be, and how far 'the Supreme being' can dwell. There is equal probability that the person next to you is 'the big cheese', as it is for the creator of all things to be hidden to our perception for all eternity, and spirits are great prankster enjoying to play with devotion of lesser beings.

In such situation Mr. Milton could fully indulge in his perverse pleasures. By conveniently putting mental suggestions into suitable prophets he inspired creation of several religions and beliefs, and made them spread throughout the world. Also by selected influence he sicked people against each other. That was his principal masterpiece – the one that made all pleasures possible. If there ever was a supreme being, creator of everything, then indeed it was an absentee landlord – for he had never met it. With him being both Satan and Jahve, the world was an oyster in his hand and he absolutely loved that song. It was such pleasure listening to that little girl while he was possessing that escaped prisoner – he was humming it all the time during his debauchery in Vegas.

With great fondness he remembered and often time-jumped to that St. Bartholomew's day in Paris. Ah...All those blood-thirsty fanatics. And that marvellous month of 1942 during which he was silently possessing Mr. Stern. First he drank the man's fear in his day-to-day existence in hiding. Then he enjoyed the man's desperation when Gestapo picked up the Sterns. And lastly the orgasm, as the man kept some hope till the last moment and died with prayer in his heart, all that spiced with frightened cries of other suffocating victims.

He looked briefly at his watch... "I'm in the mood for some Arab cuisine.", and he was off to Mecca to watch pilgrims walk over each other.

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Daniel went one more time over the scriptures showing specifics of the ritual he witnessed two months ago.

Roughly a year ago he was saved by his new friends from a certain death in the desert of Sinai. He was travelling from Memphis to Jericho when his ride went wild, frightened by a scorpion – in the future he would be more careful when travelling by non-magical means. Even with magic he would be a goner if Abraham and his large family hadn't been passing by.

He decided to stay some time with them and repay them with his artwork his ancestors had secret of.

Two months ago they were marking a new-born boy using strange ritual to put a mark on the boy's penis. According to Abraham's explanation it was the mark of belonging to God's chosen people.

Daniel was the only one able to detect the subtle movement of metaphysical energies. It also explained the odd feeling he was getting about the men of the tribe. Having been able to observe their other religious rituals in great detail he understood: that bastard who presents itself as supreme deity of this people had bound souls of men and is virtually eating its worshipers.

He couldn't outright tell them the truth – even if they believed him, it would mean getting himself and his ancestors' powers known to an angry enemy spirit.

Some of the tribe's Elders have knowledge and capacity to perform some magic. It would be convenient to gently introduce slight changes in the ritual and in their religious practices. He would of course have to share slight portion of his knowledge.

His careful discussions with old Zohar, the most magically gifted of the tribe, enabled him to set a suitable plan. The tribe had already seen his generous nature and utility of enchanted pottery. He would show Zohar how to use runes and combine them with their script to form secret words holding power. With carefully placed words in their sacred scriptures and in their prayers they would be safe without the need to change their customs. Zohar proposed to call the new magical practice 'Kabbalah'.

After making final verification that his gift would always bring protection to these people, Daniel erased their memories of his presence among them and disappeared. Hopefully he hadn't spent too much time in one place for that woman to find him. She was also fighting parasite spirits and was incredible lover, but her overkill fury against humankind had driven them apart. Coming from a family of artists and craftsmen, Daniel was of the view that mistakes of humans were like imperfections on ceramics – bringing character to the piece, and that magic itself would deal with them in proper way.

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Dumaine couldn't stop laughing. It surprising how some events holding deadly serious importance can turn hilarious.

Ed's mission was a complete success. Not only had Rasputin's ritual to summon 'the Key' been interrupted by the Bureau, but thanks to Ed the vortex was misdirected without anyone being the wiser. Instead of some 'big bad', Professor Bruttenholm greeted the arrival of a girl called Lyra Belaqua. (Due to inter-dimensional differences in soul-synchronisation, this person would become the first universal animagus, able to take any form. For the same reason the girl emerged from the vortex on an enormous white teddy-bear). Coming from magical society significantly more advanced, Lyra Belaqua would play major part in technological and cultural revolution of wizard society, influencing many great people in key-positions, even Albus Dumbeldore himself, to make their world a better place.

As the vortex got completely unstable, Ed conveniently placed the box, and all those gentlemen that got sucked will have a nice, long session with 'the Pope of pain'.

Lastly, Dumaine had the idea it would be good to cut enemy's future efforts. Therefore they took 'the Right Hand' from the red kid transformed it into its energy form of Loc-Nar. They decided to hide it in plain sight and gave it to some monks for safekeeping saying it was the key to open all dimensional barriers (which it was among other things). They took the red kid, slightly changed his appearance, and a demon lady called Mrs. Turner adopted him.

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It was one of rare missions Ed didn't really like. It was after all one of those moments when Leviathan would follow its own agenda. Also, Ed didn't like getting on Pandora's bad side. Said woman was now lying unconscious in hospital bed after her host Lily Potter had a misadventure with the gloom.

Posing as a healer, Ed was injecting special solutions that would put in motion Leviathan's personal plans for one Harry Potter.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7:Pride of Harold Potter and Kreacher's secret

It was one of life's great pleasures for Lord Harold to sit in the dark room lighted only by moonlight and watch his grandchildren sleep. For he considered all children of the coven as his grandchildren. He enjoyed this peaceful moment of the day as often as possible, he could finally relax his mind a bit while still remaining concentrated on what matters the most - the next generation. Unfortunately his obligations made him often occupied and it was only today that he and Lady Josephine could arrive from London. It was true that he relinquished his position of Head of the family to James, but the dangerous game the Potters played since the dawn of their memory made it impossible for a person to retire. Tomorrow would be important day, he would honour James' request to preside over the ritual. The ritual derived from many traditions, one of which was Druidic, all mixed with research carried out by Lily and James - and James preferred putting his trust into his own father rather than taking the services of the High Druid of Albion (Chief Druid of the United Kingdom). Also, there were many family secrets still guarded by Harold, and James knew it would be highly useful to ask his father for counsel in the matter of the ritual.

Harold committed with James the same mistake he often chided Albus for - her preferred to keep him from the burden of secrets. James was the second son, he could have lived a free life, unburdened by 'the Potter curse' - the most guarded family secret. Repeated conflicts with a powerful female entity (Harold believed she could have been Modron) made the first born son in each generation recipient of the curse. It had started with Laurentius Potter and at first the family thought that they would 'only' suffer from becoming 'Master of Death'. Unfortunately it seems that the 'woman' had extremely perverse sense of humour and following generation started suffering much more aggravated torture. The Potters were too much engaged in the 'Light vs. Dark' conflict and with every generation their reputation as keepers of balance grew which often put them in enemy position of all players in the conflict. The definition of 'balance' is highly sensitive matter, further complicated by question of what is 'dark' and what is 'light' and which one is supposed to win, therefore the Potters often even ended becoming enemies of other proponents of the 'balance' position. With every victory in the game, with every sacrifice made (like the victory of Alyssa Potter over Azazel: she had managed to finally trap the 'Fallen' demon like many others tried before her, for the price of her own life) the next first born son would gain both the powers of the family member and the powers of the enemy. That led to the necessity to hide the children, for too much power attracts jealousy and fear, and attracts new enemies who desire having that power themselves. Those Potters affected by the curse were obliged to live secluded existence in a specially designed chamber in the Potter tower, the first Potter home on British soil built near Londinium.

Harold's own brother died from the effects of magical pressure, therefore Harold and Josephine waited long years before having children until finding a way to guarantee the safety of their first born. Even with powerful wards to allow his relatively peaceful life, Charles Potter was a surprise for his parents - with him, the curse had reached the utmost apex, for he became the holder of complete family magic (including vanquished enemies) and not just the power accumulated since Laurentius Potter. What had led to this change in the level of the curse was unknown. Under wards so powerful that would make Hogwarts seem like a match light compared to the sun, Charles still suffered powerful bursts of accidental magic.

One such episode led to Albus Dumbledore becoming intimate friend of the family. Though his parents took great precaution, due to circumstances one of Charles' violent crises was witnessed by the Headmaster. Albus mistakingly identified Charles' affliction as similar to the one his sister suffered from, and the Potters were obliged to agree with his diagnosis - Albus could only detect that wards were powerful enough to block his own magic, but not exactly how powerful they were. Thinking that he could help this family, Albus offered his connections. He called in the best specialist in warding and runes he knew, his friend Edward.

Edward was strange individual, even among wizards, but higly professional. He had extremely wast knowledge and even with edited version of the problem he received from the Potters, he still managed to produce a solution. It was a special block and compact runes that could allow the wards to be transferred to a simple bracelet that could be hidden in a wand holster. That is how, suddenly, Charles found himself with possibility to lead a normal life and even go to Hogwarts. That also led Harold to make that terrible mistake and avoid telling his sons the complete truth. All they knew was that Charles suffered from a curse that affected the first born son of every generation and that he had to wear the bracelet permanently in order to lead a normal life. They ignored that the curse bestowed upon Charles complete power of the Potter family since the beginning of magic.

It is true that Potters were usually Gryffindors. Harold, however, needed every ounce of his Slytherin control to avoid bursting at his son when James told him about the ritual the Potter coven had started and which would be concluded on the next Samhain. It was after all the similar ritual, performed by Laurentius Potter, that was origin of complete taboo established by the Wizengamoth of all rituals involving mixing of magic from different families since such ritual caused turning one of most important families in wizarding Britain into near squibs - it was conveniently ignored by certain members (political allies of the Gaunts) that the same ritual probably saved entire wizarding community. Of course, Harold was actually mostly angry at himself for not explaining everything to James. He was not, however, a sort of man to cry over spilt milk – even if there were many unknowns concerning interaction between the curse and the ritual and what would be consequences for his grandson.

The old man stood there by the window, watching Harry sleep. He found it uncanny just how much Harry looked like Charles – and it filled his heart with both joy and sadness. Maybe something of his missing boy would come back home. Even a person well planted in the real world can't avoid such line of thought. After all, what is 'real' for magic?

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The train ride was rather uneventful. Which was a pleasant change considering the past year. He still couldn't explain why he accepted to help his brother in that far-fetched project. He never truly believed in the power of sex magic – considering all the frauds in the matter, the latest and most well known being Rasputin. Let's just say that considering the rumours Prince Yusupov expected to find quite a handful, but was disappointed by the size.

James and Lily had left the compartment to perform their prefect duties, and Charles also suspected they would go snog somewhere afterwards. James and his little gang of merry wizards sure had great luck with girls, but he wasn't the one to be envious of other people's happiness. After all, this year he had his part of hot sessions thanks to the Black sisters. He regretted such nice girls had to suffer from the scandal after three of them had been found by Professor Slughorn in the Shrieking Shack engaged in passionate threesome – some students noticed that screams coming from there were not the ones associated with ghosts. The Howler he received after was worth it to the tenfold.

Charles was brought out of his thoughts by a flicker – sunshine was reflecting on polished surface of a puzzle-box, Lily's puzzle-box. He had seen her play with it before. Usually she guarded it preciously, but now she left it on her seat. It was a strange work of art and Charles wanted to touch it – if it is of muggle fabrication it is quite an achievement. He wondered whether he could solve it. At first it was difficult to see any logic behind the construct, but his movement became more and more precise – like the box was an old friend. When he thought he solved it, the box made final movements by itself and a pleasant tune played. Charles was baffled – in an object capable of such complex movements they managed to include a music box – it was incredible. He felt some movement of magic.

The moment later the door of compartment opened and Charles reflexively put the box behind his back. Instead of Lily and James, it was Lucius Malfoy and his goons the Lestranges brothers. Lucius was already a graduate, but it was a common practice among purebloods to visit their betrothed and spend time with them at Hogwarts.

"Well, well... What have we here?... Potter, the squib... No wonder you're all alone."

"..."

"You know, I am not the kind of person to hit invalids, but I can't let it pass that you took what's mine and Rodolphus here is rightly pissed too... I mean, two pure gems sullied by an almost mudblood... Yeah! That's what you are... no better than a stinking muggle!`"

Charles sincerely hoped to avoid this meeting, but the chance was not on his side... Well it was time to brawl.

He jumped forward and kneed one and punched the other Lestrange, they doubled in pain and he pushed all three of them out of compartment. He quickly closed the door and jumped to the side, avoiding shards that came as Lucius' spell hit the door. Spells started to fly in the earnest.

"Hold on Charles!" came his brother's shout.

Malfoy and the Lestranges were now being fired on from two sides. James in the passage and Charles in the compartment behind transfigured seats. The three idiots were in the open and bound to lose.

In anger and desperation, Lucius fired some dark curse he wasn't really expecting to work. There was a strong flash of light in the compartment, a scream of pain, and silence....

The three came out of their stupor. Lucius said "Enough! He got what was coming to him." and they run away pushing people that were in their way.

The moment later, James was at the compartment's door, taking the first sight of the disaster.

Blood was all over the walls and pieces of human skin were spread over the seats.

"...How...Charles...No, no, no, no...Noooo!!!"

The puzzle-box stood on Lily's trunk in ominous majesty, completely unnoticed.

...................................................................................................................................................

He woke up in a cold desert. It was barely dawn. His body was sore all over.

He tried to remember who he was and how he came there... He was unsuccessful.

He came to a rocky hill... Climbed it...

In a distance there was an oasis... He also spotted white of some tents...He was saved...

The man that was once Charles Potter would be named Enkidu by Goblin explorers. They would help him arrive to Ararat.

.................................................................................................................................................

In far away, seemingly empty place, a group of beings dwell. The only thing they perceive of each other are echo of their minds as they communicate, It is the only thing in this place... together with their work of art – a fractal structure of virtual realities embedded into each other creating intricate flows.

It was a true place of Leviathan's existence and Leviathan was giving a report to its companions – the Architects.

"Karma singularity has been established. All lines are connected to Harry Potter. The system is nominal. Prometheus may proceed with implementation."

..................................................................................................................................................

'The obnoxious little gnome', as Sirius had dubbed him, was now all alone in the big, gloomy mansion.

The Black family really had no luck in these dangerous times.

One son, a black sheep, got himself with that Potter, as if his own family wasn't good enough.

The other, the beloved of the family, got himself killed in the Dark Lord's service. Regulus was indeed a very kind and loved master, but even a lowly house elf like Kreacher could tell he wasn't fit to be a Death Eater, to be a criminal.

The three sisters were once jewels of the family, but that time was gone. The eldest run away and married a muggle-born wizard. Two others ended in marriages that brought almost nothing to the family. Sure, the Malfoys and the Lestranges were once great names, but too late the Blacks discovered Lucius and Rodolphus were just ass-lickers to this new Dark Lord. Sure he preached the blood-purity, but no one was sure of his identity. In the underground circles they called him 'You know who' and 'He who must not be named' as only selected few of his followers were allowed to use his name.

After Grindelwald fiasco the Blacks were cautious about backing the next big bad pretending to be the Dark Lord. They were still content when Regulus showed ambition to grow into his own. Well... that was not to be. Regulus might had been meek, but he had been smart and had seen what the Dark Lord truly was: a puppet in the hands of Rockwood. There was no ambition to be in the same place with Malfoy.

Regulus really was too perceptive for his own good, and that would be his undoing.

Misfortune followed, and after series of accidents and obscure deaths Kreacher was now reduced to serve a mad portrait.

Nevertheless, there were still Blacks alive and Kreacher would proudly serve his precious family even if that family was now reduced to a particularly ungrateful master.

He thought as he cleaned the floor about the treasure that lied under the board. The Black house elves were some of few, brave enough to collect their own treasure. There now lied that cursed locket that caused death of his beloved master, and there lied that ring – the first treasure of the Black house elves, guarded for countless generations long before they entered the service of the Black family.

The ring doesn't look like much more than a shine piece of jewellery. Its only magical property is to give invisibility, which is pretty useless to a house elf. The only reason Kreacher liked to wear it was that it made him less alone since there were voices inside.

The ring had been brooding for ages, feeling absolutely dejected by its misfortune. It was falling, held by the deformed Hobbit. It was all planned and part of safety mechanism installed by Sauron; if he ever lost the ring – it would eventually come back to the pits of Doom and the holder of the ring would feel compelled to jump into the volcano. Magic of the sacrifice would open paths that would enable reunification of Sauron with the power he gave away to create the rings and also take the power other rings stole from their bearers.

Unfortunately, it was Frodo holder of the ring, the one who was supposed to sacrifice himself. The fact that it was insane Sméagol who jumped changed the paths. Gollum and the ring arrived to a new reality, where he was mistaken for something called a house-elf and the ring ended being forever separated from its master. Sméagol's descendants came into the service of Cygnus Blanc – a wizard from a very old and noble family, serving Charlemagne as his champion. Cygnus' motto was 'Toujours pur': Always keep a pure heart.

The ring waited, hoping to meet a new master, someone worthy of its power. The family who became owners of the elves soon became completely submerged in the powerful malevolent aura. The Blancs became the Blacks and moved to Britain.

Young Regulus showed such great promises. But the bad luck of the ring worked its way and the young man died before the ring could start waking Regulus' dormant powers and transforming him into Sauron's successor. Who knows how many more centuries the ring would have to wait to find a worthy master.

........................................................................................................................................................

Sirius never liked coming back to this place. Some hiding places in the mansion could be only accessed by a Black. He was thankful that Lily was with him to quickly check if the books had information they needed.

He suddenly felt chills creeping down his neck and filling him completely.

His head turned quickly and he saw two eyes watching him from a dark corner of the room.

"What are you doing here you ugly gnome?! Don't you have other places of this house to keep gloomy?"

"Sorry traitorous master, but I felt call from precious mistress."

"Don't tell me you became so old to forget where my mother's portrait is?"

"No, of course not traitorous master." And he disappeared. Sirius never noticed the intense look in Kreacher's eyes while he observed Lily. Kreacher was a lonely elf and Sirius a kid with traumatic childhood, but Lily always found amusing their exchanges.

The ring was happy again. Totally euphoric. Its luck finally turned – not only one, but two worthy persons. Of course the woman was an obvious choice, the laud signal of darkness it received from that woman left Sauron's essence stirring with impatience. But the child was the prize beyond anything it could hope for. The ring had made a decision: Harry Potter's magic was so complete and overwhelming, it was everything Sauron ever wanted to achieve and Harry Potter would become the new master of the ring.

........................................................................................................................................................

Catherine was adopted. She was very loved and had happy childhood, but she was always intrigued who her biological parents were. What circumstances led to her adoption?

It was one of great regrets she felt in the moment she prepared herself for the sacrifice to save humanity. She will never have family with the man she loved, but that man will continue to live. Maybe he will dream of her like they dreamed of those people from the future who sent the warning to the priests of the church.

With that thought and resignation not to let destruction befall her loved ones, Catherine jumped through the mirror, taking her possessed colleague with her.

Catherine would end being sent to the future and meeting those people who sent the message that ultimately saved everybody.

Marsh would often dream of her. Her smiling face from that doorway would be great comfort in his feeling of loss.

Catherine would never learn that her biological mother was Alyssa Potter, who did similar sacrifice to defeat Azazel.

John Milton was slightly miffed. That powerless, girl managed to stop his great project of another great feast – this was supposed to be even better than the World War II.

Well, it was not a serious loss for him. After all, he was still groggy from that last orgasm – it was great idea to possess that prostitute from Nagasaki.

John Milton would never know that this powerless girl, combined with the Potter curse just sealed his faith.


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8: About the Leader of Light and the Dark Lord

Lot had been written about Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts, Head of the Wizengamoth, Chief Warlock at the IWC, etc. Quite natural for someone who's been under the spotlight for so long. Ever since the rise of the Great Dark Lord Grindelwald and even more after his defeat, Albus was seen as the Leader of Light and the wise shepherd.

After the World War II Albus hoped to finally earn some peace. For some years his wish was fulfilled. Unfortunately in the 1960s a new menace showed its face – Lord Voldemort, ambitious young wizard whose desire was to become greater and more feared than Grindelwald himself.

Albus wondered if it was maybe his destiny to be involved in so many troubled events. Maybe the fact he was born during tumultuous times for Europe in the 1840s was sign he was under the famous curse: "May you live in interesting times".

Still, nothing in his nature called him to adventure. He was a scholar, a researcher. He was looking for peace and quiet. Oh, how he longed for that peaceful life he led with the Flamels. He was just an apprentice then, but now he would gladly give up all his titles for some tranquillity and anonymity.

He could clearly remember the day his life changed. The day Fawkes came to him.

Before that, Albus was like majority of Wizard world, always trying to remain a bystander. In fact it's almost as though passivity can be considered general trait of wizards. People worship heroes, but they prefer staying as far away as possible from any heroic activity. In fact one could speculate if wizards are related to hobbits (even if they are from different realities).

Albus was so depressed after his brother's family was killed. He felt responsible for bringing Grindelwald into their lives.

After the rupture with Grindelwald over his radical ideas and the death of Ariana, the former engaged on the path of total darkness and was doing anything to be the centre of Albus' life, even in the negative way.

The fact that it was never determined which wand emitted the spell that killed Ariana did nothing to ease Albus' consciousness, it made him feel worse – knowing that, in this matter too he brought burden to his brother's heart. Albus was drowning in the maelstrom of violent times that submerged wizarding world and in his own depression.

The morning after one of inebriating sessions, Albus woke up to find a bird perched on his bed, looking him in stern manner. His floo flared and a person asked for permission to enter his home. This was Edward, a young man he met couple of days ago and who was introduced to him by Headmaster Dippet.

Dippet had apparently met Edward at the Hog's Head, the Aberforth's place, and he was completely bewildered by the young man's capacity to efficiently perform magic under the influence of firewhisky and also by the ability to make a non-foul sobering potion.

Dippet was of the opinion Albus could use an apprentice to help and some cheering, which explained presence of a phoenix and of the young man.

Albus had managed quite a few important academic achievements, which caused people to see him as the most powerful light wizard since Merlin. Suddenly politicians were coming to him for advice concerning dark lords who were fighting for supremacy, of which Grindelwald seemed to be the most frightening.

Naturally Albus was panicked. He was no fighter or had any experience in organising resistance against terrorists. However, his fear was not to die, but to let down all those people who put their faith in him. He was desperate with desire to make everyone survive the threat of Grindelwald. He promised to himself and the memory of Ariana that no innocent girl will die again because of his once-friend.

Unfortunately, his desire to do "Greater Good" caused him to make important mistakes. He was manipulating people as if they were chess pieces, keeping them in the dark as he didn't dare fully trust anyone or burden them with his own responsibilities.

Fawkes and Edward had two-fold influence on Albus. They made Albus-the scholar completely reassess what he considered knowledge about magic. Fawkes also opened a path for Albus-the leader of Light.

Soon at Hogwarts, students had started rumours that a phoenix had chosen to bond with him, and later the entire wizarding society would see him as the symbol of light – the next coming of Merlin.

Without Fawkes, Albus wouldn't be half the wizard he is today and he certainly wouldn't go after Grindelwald.

For many years now, Albus was playing the game of politics and manipulation. It was a necessary evil when one is dubbed "Leader of Light" and so much faith is put in him by his peers. Still, he was only a man with his faults and his strengths. Albus felt very lucky to have strong willed allies that helped him remain humble and keep his feet on the ground in dangerous times: the Potters, Edward and Fawkes.

...

Laurentius Potter and Ezekiel Gaunt were both men with strong belief the what matters the most is how the gift of life a person receives is used. The fact that Ezekiel was now a squib meant little to them and they remained the best of friends. After all, the ritual allowed salvation of entire magical culture, and they felt only a sense of completeness having managed to achieve what they were called for to Berlin.

Unfortunately neither of friends suspected that consequences of the ritual touched not only Ezekiel, but his entire family. When they returned to England, they knew naturally there would be no fanfare as it was completely unknown what they did to save their world. They also didn't expect to be ambushed by angry members of the Gaunt family who understood that whatever had happened had something to do with Ezekiel.

The Gaunt family council was separated in two: one half supported Ezekiel's decision to participate in the ritual, and though they regretted their magic, they were happy the gift had been used to save their and many other magical communities; other half believed Ezekiel should be banished as traitor to the family, and perhaps even executed for his crime to engage family magic in such a ritual.

The Gaunt family broke in two factions. Blood feud was called between these two factions and between the Potters and the Gaunts who hated them.

Many Gaunts perished along with some Potters, and while the Potters emerged almost unscathed, the Gaunt family was destroyed. They were one of the most important wizarding families and they lost all their influence. They lost their pride.

After couple generations the Gaunts were nearly extinct and even worse, they started to inbreed because they felt mistrust to all other families.

Merope Gaunt was youngest of two children of old Marvolo Gaunt and a hag he raped in Knockturn Alley. Marvolo himself, suffered greatly consequences of inbreeding of past generations, and was desperate enough in his desire to break this cycle and not transmit his defects to his children.

Strangely enough, he was successful. Unlike what some evil rumours would say, Merope was a very pretty witch. She was still average in power, but at least none of her father's deformations were passed on to her or her brother Morfin. There was a new hope for the Gaunts.

Significant number of once prosperous families suffered greatly the consequences of the Plague. Not wanting to say their last word while newly rich families or those who fled the French Revolution invaded British isles, the Gaunts cultivated sort of underground movement with other destroyed families – of whom were also the Prince family.

It happens that both the Gaunts and the Princes had good luck in the last generation, both families were blessed with sons free of defects – which is quite the miracle as boys, with only one X chromosome, are less protected by magic against genetic deformation.

Edgar Prince and Merope Gaunt being childhood sweethearts led to their betrothal and marriage. Their pride and joy was Eileen Prince – little girl was promised to become beautiful and strong witch. All seemed going for the best.

Unfortunately, Morfin Gaunt, the brother, was very ambitious and manipulating young man. He wanted more than anything to re-establish the prestige of the family and would stop at nothing to achieve the goal. His hunger was not nearly sated enough by his sister's happiness. His eyes were set on Riddle Manor – formerly Gaunt Manor. The exquisite manor was jewel in the crown of Gaunt properties that family lost after the Great Plague, somewhere in the XVIII century the manor was bought and restored by a family of nouveau-riches muggles, the Riddles.

The Princes were only slightly better off than the Gaunts, and Morfin had no regrets to organise that little accident that would claim Edgar's life. Morfin abducted his sister so he could brainwash her and prepare her for the task of seducing young Tom Riddle Esq., the heir of the Riddle fortune.

Morfin's plan was a success and Merope was soon with child. Morfin hoped that Tom Riddle, under influence of love potions would agree to marry his sister so that the Gaunts would again have access to their ancestral home.

However, destiny has ways of throwing monkey wrench even in the most elaborate plans. In this case it was the fact that young Tom Riddle brought new untainted blood completely clean of magic into the magical family whose magic was literally suffocating due to all inbreeding. Magic was so happy by the coming of new blood into the family that the conceived child was showing such incredible magical affinity that all control mechanisms, established by Morfin so that Merope would do his bidding, broke when she entered in the third month. Merope stopped feeding love potions to Tom Riddle and the young man after his thoughts cleared left the pregnant woman to engage himself into a very successful business venture in London and start a promising political career.

Merope died alone and homeless, giving birth to a baby boy. This gave new possibilities to Morfin. He took little Tom Marvolo to the Gringotts. It was illegal for wizards to practice any kind of blood magic so goblins offered all kinds of services for a suitable price. The most widely used was a paternity test using goblin magic, precursory of the test using DNA. Goblins also had many contacts with legal firms working both in muggle and magical worlds and it was possible, using the results of paternity test to establish succession form if the will of the deceased was lost or was never made.

Naturally, goblins also used this practice to establish a database of abilities for children born out of wedlock and that information represented important source of income for the bank. It wasn't too bad that it also offered a sort of vengeance against wizards for goblin humiliation after numerous rebellions. The wedlock has broader meaning in magical world than among muggles. In magical world wedlock describes marriage, soul-bonding, coven-bonding, and all other possible type of bonds where individual either by ceremony or even by magic alone becomes part of a family unit. Wedlock represents guarantee that family magic protects children born from the union. Only in rare cases is the term 'out of wedlock' applicable, usually in cases where love potions or rape are involved. Unprotected magical children are priced commodity – if some rituals need sacrificial offerings, if some potions need human ingredients, etc.

Morfin was full of joy. He had official document to claim Gaunt manor when he disposes of Riddle family. Furthermore, he made hefty sum when he sold the baby to the goblins.

Goblins were more than happy to pay. After all, they completely swindled the clueless criminal. The boy was worth infinitely more than what they paid. Given the boy's magical affinity, it would be like dissecting Merlin's body for potion ingredients. But before putting the kid on the market, he would spend some time in 'the orphanage' – goblin facility where human children grow until their organs and/or magical levels are good to be harvested.

Goblins actually dispose of several such facilities in muggle London. It's the subterfuge they devised to hide in plain sight from the wizards. For all needs these institutions are muggle orphanages, all staff is muggle and completely ignorant of the ultimate purpose they are serving. At regular intervals an overseer (a goblin under charm) would visit the places to keep the updates on the merchandise.

...

Tom Marvolo Riddle was five. The Orphanage was the only home he had ever known – if you can call 'home' a place that was almost like Azkaban. Today was the day Tom learnt his name – before he was just a number. Today, Tom was sold to a gentleman from the Unspeakables.

Augustus Rockwood, Director of Applied Research Department was a very happy wizard. The price he paid for the child was worth it. The kid had it all, unbelievable magical levels and was also incredibly smart – a genius. His physical condition was also very good, drill masters will have good base to work from. Finally, after years of searching he was holding somebody who could easily take down all 'Champions of Light' and who was totally mouldable.

...

The great success of the operation brought advancement to Senior Director Rockwood. And it was just the beginning. Soon his weapon would take down all the fools from the Ministry and Croaker, his archrival in the agency and ideological enemy.

In the drill chamber, nine-year old Tom was going through a simulation. He was shooting wandless spells at targets representing muggles. He was playing a role of a wizard terrorist.

Since he had started playing simulations Tom was given a code name: 'Voldemort'. While shooting he kept chanting the mantra: "I decide who lives or dies.. I decide who lives or dies... I decide who lives or dies.."


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9: The Power He Knows Not

The Master was enjoying pleasant and sunny day on the terrace of his atelier. Almost every day was pleasant and sunny on the island of Thera. He enjoyed very much the fact that his house was turned toward the south and outer sea and the magnificent view of the far horizon were blue of the sea and blue of the sky met, instead of the bay and the dull view of the inner harbour and the network of channels.

He had just completed a set of his famous potteries and was taking a pause and enjoying the view trying to test if his eyes were still good and how soon would he be able to spot his daughter Galatea retouring from fishing.

The Master was well known for his principle of leading a self-sustained existence and his apprentices were expected not only to work in the atelier, but also to work in all aspects of day-to-day life: house-keeping, food cultivating or gathering.

Thera was an island in the Aegean sea and also the name of the settlement on said island. It was the land blessed by the gods and many travellers had come anchor their ships in gentile waters of this paradise island. As centuries passed a mixed communities emerged: Fay colonists from Atlantis, Elves, Veelas, Humans, Merpeople and Nymphae made their homes on the surface, and Dwarves, Goblins and Orcs established their underground city in the vast volcanic chamber. It was a real life utopia and species lived in symbiosis, each produced and received, those on surface produced food and other resources gathered on the surface, those underground produced energy and ores and kept volcano from erupting.

The Master's family originated from ancient Veela-Human colonies along the rivers of Danube, Dnepr, Dniester and Don, which were famous as it had been there that Humans first started to make rune-inscribed potteries even before the Fays had given them magic. When wizards came invading the lands, the refuges established themselves on the island of Thera.

For a certain time the Master had been the last of his family line. In his adolescence he apprenticed both with his parents and with a friend of the family who was like a brother to his father. The Master was incredibly powerful magical user, he had learnt ways of many species and was one of the first being able to wield magic and control essences of all elements, which had been enormously useful in his art-work.

In times when he had just begun his apprenticeship, a mysterious noble-woman came from a faraway land. She kept herself hidden and many speculated if she was victim of a curse of some other affliction that could have had damaged her beauty. One day she came to this same atelier, which was then his father's and while waiting for a command to be completed was resting herself on this same terrace and enjoying the view. Suddenly a gentle breeze briefly lifted the delicate semi-transparent drapes that separated the terrace and the boy could see her clearly, even if just only for a second. On some form of exquisitely crafted recliner chair lied an infinitely more exquisite woman, her beauty a true masterpiece of whichever entity created life.

Later, the Master made a pilgrimage to the lands famous for their own art-work in order to complete his apprenticeship. He also made that voyage to see if he could find some woman of similar beauty – he didn't want to find the same woman for he feared the time would had invariably altered that which were his fondest memories. No other woman could have ever competed. Thus the Master remained without wife and progeny.

As the time passed the Master wanted more and more that someone special to whom he would pass his knowledge, powers and the atelier. He decided that even if he didn't have a wife he would create an artificial child who would grow and develop like normal.

He called the deepest of the magic he knew, while using the most special ingredients in creation of the body for his child – it was a mixture of clays, ores, plants and minerals, and many mysterious liquids and gases. The Master applied the totality of his art. At one point he entered a trance and as he was controlling the flow of magic though himself and his work of art, the one he met so long ago appeared to him, only she seemed even more beautiful than in his memories and he was certain the woman he was seeing was beyond what any but the ultimate being could imagine.

She wore semi-transparent garments that enhanced her sex appeal, not that she needed any enhancement of that. It had been a while since any woman was capable of provoking any physical response of his old body. Now this response was not only in his groin, but through his entire body. The woman wore ouroboros tattoo on her shoulder.

"I am the Lust. I am realisation of your deepest Desire. I am love, passion and destruction. You will bow and worship me."

The Master fell on his knees and his member uncontrollably sprouted semen in direction of the woman.

The woman's body transformed into a mass of shadows only leaving her face visible, and the mass of shadows soared and collected semen before it touched the ground. Then that mass entered the Master and he started trembling uncontrollably. After what seemed much longer than the actual time it had taken the mixture of Master's and Woman's essences emerged and latched itself on what looked like a statue of a little girl. The morning after Galatea was living the first day of her life.

As the years went by, Galatea had proved to be exceptionally gifted for the art, causing jealousy among older apprentices by the ease with which she crated. She also enjoyed nature and any kind of outdoor activity. Sooner than he would like, the Master found himself in a quandary: Galatea had managed to surpass him in the art, and entire nature had become her atelier. Galatea's specialty was ephemeral creation like bringing the glowing fish through the city channels and the glowing butterflies through the city streets and orchards for the celebration of Dionysus during mid-summer night.

There had been only one cloud in the otherwise clear sky over Thera: the envoys of Knossos. Actually, the Master was one of few to have some reservations about this delegation representing both the king and wizard community of Crete. The Master was a well travelled man and had met this sort of people: bringing the gifts in one hand, but holding the sword in the other. As one of human magical users, the Master was approached by wizards of Knossos who sought to establish their base on Thera and take the magical resources of the island for themselves. They sought to turn humans of the island against other species. The envoys presented themselves as peaceful traders to the general population and as bringers of liberation to magical humans in particular.

Through various alliances: marriages or monetary gain, the wizards had managed to form connections with humans in the governing body of the island. Though the island remained independent, wizards were in position to manipulate decisions

For the Master times were getting more depressing every day. That certainly seemed to be the case of the last year, was the man's opinion. Even if the Master had not been an extremely intelligent man, he would have still been able to see the doom where the latest decisions of the Island Council were directing their community. What was truly depressing was the fact the wizards present on the Council were barely hiding their ultimate plans as of lately. Which meant the time was coming close when the envoys would start open hostilities toward other magical species in order to put their plan of taking the island's resources in motion.

Nevertheless, the Master was preparing himself to enjoy another Dionysus celebration. It was his favourite time of the year since earliest childhood, and he wouldn't let anything spoil his pleasure and the carefree feeling he was filled with every year.

...

The fleet of prince Asterion advanced slowly but with determination towards the island of Thera. As a young child, Asterion had actually been adopted by the king of Knossos and was not of truly noble descent or it could be said that his family belonged to the very recent nobility. Importance of Asterion's biological family lied quite simply in the fact of their holding important place in the powerful Snake Goddess cult.

The Snake Goddess cult had been gaining popularity among people of Crete for some time, and in the last generation had achieved the high distinction of being named "the royal cult". The cult had actually been a screen for the sect calling themselves "Familiars", whose origin could have been traced to Akkadian and Elamite Empires. For unknown number of generations, the Familiars had been practicing selective breeding, driven by desire of producing offspring with the best possible qualities. Recently, the Familiars had managed to produce offspring showing supernatural characteristics which had opened them new genetic resource – the magical world: mostly the wizards, but some members liked to sequestrate Fairies, Veelas or Elfish princesses.

Asterion was the most successful example of these recent practices: incredibly beautiful, with health and strength well beyond what was considered human norm, and naturally with formidable magical powers.

Upon the arrival, the young prince would enter the function of Ambassador to the King. Unofficially he would become the true ruler of Thera, pulling the strings of the puppet Council in the name of wizardkind and directing to Crete the resources of this now very important colony. His task was also to prepare the cleaning operation of what wizards considered infestation by other magical species. Again, even more unofficially, in this particular matter, the prince was to act as a Familiar representative, offering alliance to other magical species in exchange of enabling their escape from the trap the wizards of Crete were setting.

Some days ago, the fishing expedition to replenish their food reserves had yielded strange discovery in their nets, a rune-covered object the size of an extremely heavy stone, but which was lighter than expected. The prince and expedition leaders deemed it was exactly what it looked like – some form of rune-stone that somehow ended in the middle of the sea.

Having another sleepless night, Asterion descended in the hold. It was one of those nights when he was the only man awake on the ship – it was a truly boring journey and inexperienced man couldn't bring himself to scold the crew for what was natural reaction: letting your guard slip.

It proved to be a crucial mistake. As he touched the stone, attracted for the nth time by the object's strangeness, the stone opened and revealed itself to be hollow and holding some light inside. The light had humanoid form and latched itself on the startled young man. After a moment the light took the form of the prince and the prince's body ended covered in some sort of cocoon. All this happened without anybody being the wiser. "The light" was very happy, he was ready to spent indefinite time in his prison, patiently waiting to be discovered by a suitable person, and the prince was perfect beyond his hopes.

Couple weeks later, Ha'gel in Asterion's form disembarked on Thera, during busy preparations for the Dionysus festival.

...

After providing another spectacular light show to mark festivities, Galatea was enjoying the dance and was happy beyond her expectations. This year she had accepted to participate in the custom brought by the merchants of Crete: the auction of beautiful girls for the right to dance with them at the closing ball.

Maybe it was all those girls who were whispering about having luck to be chosen by the mysterious young man who replaced the old head-wizard of their community, but Galatea accepted against her better judgment and the counsel of her father telling her not to mix with wizards of Crete.

She was pleasantly surprised by how her father and she had been wrong. She was having marvellous time dancing with the prince. It was one of those "magical moments" that would many times be described in future fairytales.

Unlikely the fairytales, this moment would not end with girl having to run at the stroke of midnight or some similar plot complication. For this young couple the night would end with passionate love making while holding hands and making light and magical energy running through each other's body.

Ha'gel considered himself again incredibly lucky. Ma'el had apparently withheld much more than suspected. All Ha'gel knew was that the Humans were suitable species whose evolution could be influenced to meet the wildest dreams of the Thealons. Now he was mating with a special woman having taken body of a special man. Both these people possessed capacities he was not expecting to find, they were already very close to what he wanted to give as a present to the Humans to protect them from nefarious influence of the Thaelon project. Now he could be much more ambitious than planned.

...

To say Galatea was annoyed would be putting it mildly. It seemed she was destined to join a long line of girls who after having enjoyed a torrid night with a stranger were destined to enjoy dubious pleasures of surprise pregnancy. That wouldn't have been so bad in itself, as her mating opportunities were rather slim on the island before the prince's arrival and there had been no male she would deem as suitable father material before.

What was the source of her annoyance was the accelerated and nauseating beyond belief pregnancy that only lasted the next day. And let's not forget that apparently she mated with an impostor and that freshly liberated prince Asterion was hunting for all those who entered in contact with the strange being of light.

That led to the young mother's present predicament: having to flee her home for fear of being captured and dissected and the same being done to her child and also witnessing destruction of her beloved island from effects of volcanic eruption as the stupid wizards had driven away the Goblins and the Orcs who were maintaining the stability of the island's volcanic chamber.

...

It was one of those sunny days were everything just shines as if the sunlight was carrying the dreams and hopes of the boy.

Asterion Argylos was starting his education at the Atlantean Academy. Years ago his mother and he had arrived as refugees from Thera, the refugees who were often frowned upon by the Fay as by irony the majority were the Humans who were responsible for the disaster.

The young woman had quickly made a name among the artists of Atlantis, and the boy was showing incredible talent at a very young age.

The boy would grow strong and develop his gifts and learn his mother's art. He would also, in the deepest secret, look to develop the heritage he received from his fathers. His descendants would also practice selective breeding, mixing with many peoples and species, but with consideration for their mating partners unlike what was practiced by the Familiars.

The strange origins of this family would attract curiosity of the goddess Pandora and would be the beginning of a long love-hate relationship between the goddess and the males of the family.

When these descendants would arrive later to Great Britain they would change their name to Potter. After many generations and certainly after the Great Plague catastrophe, the Potter family origin like so many secrets would fall to oblivion.

There is a sealed, long time forgotten room deep in the dungeons of the Potter manor. Wards on this chamber are of the special kind and are keyed to allow entrance only to those Potters suffering from the curse.

Creator of the chamber, Laurentius Potter, built it after his return so that he and future recipients could conduct research to counter the effects of the curse. Keying the wards only to recipients of the curse had been a considerable error on his part. As the curse potency exponentially grew with each generation, quickly no bearer of the curse was able to survive very long.

Inside the chamber is hanging a large piece of cloth similar to cloth showing a self-updating family tree which can be seen in many wizarding homes. This piece of cloth does not, however, show the Potter family tree, it shows evolution of the Potter curse. Be it through matrimony, other alliances, or conquests, an intricate network of relations shows where various powers and types of magic that became part of the curse came from. In the beginning this cloth was black with fine illuminated lines of different colour showing relations to the last bearer of the curse. As generations went by the cloth looked more gray than black as the network grew more complex. At the moment Harry Potter was conceived, this cloth became white.

...

It is rather ironic that the best magical university, Oxford Occult, and the best magical information agency in the world, Unspeakables, are both located in the United Kingdom, given the fact that the British Ministry is the most backwards among magical administrations and British wizarding society the most conservative. Even the most isolated tribes show more open mind regarding the evolution of their culture than British wizards.

Being the top most institution, it is quite natural you can find all sorts of interesting information pertaining to the nature of the universe and the structure of our world at the university.

Earth is much bigger than its physical measure would suggest. This apparent contradiction originates from the fact that Earth contains multitude of portals and gates, in the most unsuspecting places you could imagine, leading to parallel realities and/or dimensions. These often contain their own physical laws, their own type of magic. Some portals only open from time to time, and some are always opened. Many of these realities contain their own version of Earth and crossing the portals often feels like passing through a door (you don't feel a thing) – which of course results in the apparent paradox of Earth being bigger than its actual physical size.

Unspeakables have managed to gather a rather extensive database of these portals. However, some doors to parallel worlds are located in truly unique places and their configuration made it so that even Unspeakables missed the knowledge of their existence.

One such portal can be found in Suffolk, England. It is located on the lands formerly property of the Blackthorn family, a family of nobles dating from the Roman times, with reputation among the locals as utterly evil beings consorting with "the devil" or some similar things that are usually attributed in such cases to rich and mysterious families. That reputation would be source of their downfall.

In truth, the first Baron of Blackthorn was knight of the Round Table. He had earned the title for being member of the squad gathered by Martin Potter to fight the great menace upon the kingdom. After that exciting episode, Blackthorn was among men who were awarded the land and the title in exchange of becoming guardians of special and magically active places throughout the kingdom.

As the time went by, people had begun to forget what was being kept behind the warded wall.

In the time when the villagers of the nearby hamlet conveniently called "the Wall" were dying subjected to a mysterious illness, the hamlet became gathering place of local fanatics and other well-wishers keen on voicing how it must be the fault of the evil Blackthorns that the poor people is suffering. The Elders of the village gathered their flock one evening, lit great bonfires, did a little witch hunt, and voila, the family is nearly extinct and the lucky survivors are obliged to hide among the villagers. On the top of all that, some hooligans had thought it would be splendid to breach the wall of wards.

After couple of generations that sort of happenings quickly vanished from the collective memory, and the young Dunstan Thorne had no idea about the origins of his family and why he shouldn't be trying to cross the breach in the wall.

People had also forgotten that the menace that nearly destroyed wizard community in the time of King Arthur, was a magic user that came from the other side of the said wall – a woman who also considered herself a witch (even if her magic worked in complete mystery to local witches and wizards). As it was later proved that it was not her intention to cause harm to the people on this side of the wall, Markus Potter decided to spare the witch and keep her hidden.

Many later instances where a witch or wizard displayed some strange characteristics in their magic, those were descendants of the witch. The most notable cases being witches who showed strange seer capacity like Agnes Nutter, Sybil Trelawney and Luna Lovegood.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10: Importance of being Harry Potter

Even with only most basic natural laws, as that might be the case of particular universe, the universe is still capable of showing incredible richness of structures. If a universe is rich with magic, well... let's just say that the number of possibilities rises significantly. Add to that the fact there is multitude of universes, realities, dimensions, etc. and all that is connected in a moving network whose constituents often mix with each other, and you can see that obtained complexity gets utterly mind-boggling.

Such diversity means that particular environments are usually more hostile than not to beings living in them. Therefore, by simple survival instinct, if you met a benevolent, powerful being, you would call it god and worship it to gain the protection. You would even worship your predators if you believed there was some way to appease them and gain their protection, like some tribes worship lions, wolves or bears. Even with more cruel spirits, usually associated with old religions, people accept with great ease to perform sacrificial offerings to satisfy hunger of the gods.

All that was said in order to show that all religions have same probability of being right or wrong. The concept of religion itself is associated with faith and belief, and is therefore incompatible with science, philosophy or practical life (like question of sexual practices, allowed food, etc.). Gods, like ufos, serve the purpose of alleviating our paranoia and loneliness in the face of harshness of life (You are not alone! Something is out there! Long live Mulder and Scully! etc. etc.). Considering that humans tend to mix their religion with all aspects of their life, you can see why we live in a fucked up world. That is why Harry Potter would always strive to create sufficient sense of security and at the same time avoid being worshiped.

If you could observe this complex construction of all these dimensions and realities from a sufficient distance (metaphorically speaking), you could see all these details gradually blending and disappearing and in the end forming a unified chaos: the Void.

The Void is only seemingly empty, from metaphysical point of view it represents the proto-creational substance, that from which every other structure originates. Therefore, to any other structure the Void looks as empty.

Initially the Void is just chaos having ability to become multitude of forms. And for some reason forms emerged. Among these forms, spirit-like beings had abilities to move the flow of the Void and to create new forms. From this emergence of structures and the movement sprang the self-awareness of the Void and it started to grow more and more intelligent.

The Void had lot to learn. Its structure was vast beyond any possible idea of infinity and it always looked like it had just begun its research. Gently sending wavelets so as not to disturb the natural evolution of things, the Void gathered information and adapted its intelligence. Still, there was no true spark of life in this intelligence, no passion, just need to gather information.

One of probes came upon some more exotic regions. Here existed many places where the Void formed structures similar to black holes – where multitude of realities met and dimensions flew into each other. Spirits liked to come and drink from these wells or create forms and send them to particular dimension or reality. At first the Void was only slightly curious about these places and the spirits, until it came to the great chasm. It was a place similar to other wells in the Void, but this one was enormous and possessed complex fractal structure of dimensions displaying colourful chaos as they mixed together. It was the greatest structure of that type the probe had ever encountered.

Inside that well there was a spirit dwelling. Like many others it had came to drink, but its thirst was far greater than expected and the spirit was now captured inside the well, drinking information and performing various experiments with dimensional structures and realities. The more it drank, the greater its thirst were. The spirit was absolutely euphoric with possibilities this enormous well offered. The principal core of the spirit was now chained by mind threads to multitude of entry points to various realities. The spirit looked like a skilful artist playing some instrument and with every operation the spirit performed the structure of the well grew richer and richer, therefore enticing it to drink more. The spirit became master of the well – the Gankutsuou.

The meeting of the Void and the Spirit would fundamentally change them. The Void gained the spark of life and passion, and the Spirit gained an even more complete knowledge of the structure of what the well truly was – only a small part of much greater Void. And so their cooperation had started. Their purpose was to seek more spirits, create collective intelligence and experiment to create richer and more varied forms and expand the Void's dominion.

After that moment it was like the Big Bang. There really is no just word to describe the speed with which they progressed in their task. Incorporating legions of spirits who like artists developed the Void, and their melody spread calling more to join.

They were successful beyond what they thought possible and as the melody penetrated even the most isolated regions of the Void, the Collective, as it came to be known, felt they were now trapped. There was nothing more to explore – nothing more they were capable to see, no further possibilities to create new forms they could fathom. Whether the Void always had such structure, or if their activity imposed such structure, they didn't know.

They felt trapped until they found a vortex of dimensions whose form made it completely isolated from the outer regions. Inside they found group of lesser spirits who totally ignored there was something more to what they considered their world. They were so isolated that they believed they were creators of this place. They called themselves the Architects.

They had created a complex of virtual realities. A series of embedded isolated multi-verses, containing inhabitants who created more and more virtual realities. Somewhere in all that chaos was a multi-verse containing totally insignificant beings who believed they were Gods in their multi-verse. That multi-verse had capacity to evolve through magic. That place contained multitude of galaxies with many planets and civilisations. Among them was a planet, the third from its star, where wizards and witches created their society. At this point we find it unnecessary to underline the insignificance of the existence of these beings.

That is, however, not entirely correct. For, you see, the Architects had created this complex of virtual realities so that various avatars could evolve and influence Karma – that way the Architects themselves would evolve. Among these avatars, the masterpiece of creation was Harry Potter. Harry Potter is the ultimate magic user, the wielder of Karma and the ultimate evolutionary tool created by the Architects. The role of Harry Potter was to live all possible existences. At the end of every cycle – at the moment of death, the information would be collected to create new possibilities which would start new cycles. The collected knowledge could also change the Architects themselves.

The moment the Collective had set their eyes on the avatar Harry Potter, they knew it was the key for their problem. This evolutionary tool would help them transcend all possible limitations imposed by Karma. The Void would become just a particle in a new greater multi-verse.

The Collective gently penetrated the vortex, and with stealth connected a probe to the creation of Architects. Then they introduced a slight glitch into the things. The glitch transformed to become anomaly that called itself Neo. Neo entered a symbiotic relationship with one of Architects and they became Prometheus and Leviathan. They had started the project where Harry Potter tool will be used in conjunction with Karma singularity, that would enable transcending of limitations the Collective was faced with.

Unforeseen by either the Collective, or the Architects, are the far-reaching consequences that a completely insignificant event of Halloween 1981 will have on the matters. That is why no one felt need to change the events that placed certain would-be Dark Lord near Godric's Hollow on October 31, around 10h p.m.


End file.
